After European Court Decision, Google Works on a Link Removal Tool

Google will announce by the end of the month a mechanism for consumers to request that links to information about them be removed from the company’s search engine, a leading European regulator said.

It was one of the first signs that Google was working through how to operate after a court ruling said consumers could make such requests.

Ulrich Kühn, ​head of the technical department at Hamburg’s data protection regulator, one of Germany’s leading data protection agencies, said that the details of the mechanism still had to be finalized. But a basic online tool for people to ask Google to take down potentially harmful links would be in place in about two weeks, he said.

“They are trying to come up with something that users can use to lodge complaints about specific links,” Kühn said. “It will be rolled out across Europe for all citizens.”