France Wants Google to Apply ‘Right to Be Forgotten’ Ruling Worldwide or Face Penalties

France’s privacy watchdog called on Google to apply a European data protection ruling to its global domains or face financial penalties. The move relates to a decree from Europe’s top court in 2014 that allowed anyone with connections to the region to request that links about themselves be removed from search engine results. That so-called right to be forgotten ruling has pitted Google, whose search engine holds a roughly 90 percent market share in Europe, against some of the region’s privacy regulators.

The authorities want the ruling to apply to all of Google’s domains, including Google.com, although the company contends that Europe’s privacy legislation should apply only to regional domains like Google.de in Germany. French authorities are now increasing the pressure on the American company, saying that Google must apply the ruling across all of its domains in the next 15 days or face penalties including a one-off fine of up to 300,000 euros, or almost $340,000. In 2014, Google was fined €150,000 for failing to adhere to the country’s rules in a separate privacy case.