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> Deleting defamatory content from web searches
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thekohser
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 1:09pm
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QUOTE(Jon Awbrey @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 6:10am) *

QUOTE(Newyorkbrad @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 5:19am) *

Abstracting from ED specifically to a more general issue, <an earlier post and reply> raise two significant issues, one factual and one theoretical:
  1. Does Google have a procedure whereby someone can request that a website or webpage mentioning them be deleted from searchability on the grounds that is defamatory, privacy-invading, or just generally inappropriate? I am not referring to DMCA takedown notices based on copyright violations, which is a well-defined procedure but has a specific, limited purpose. More generally, does Google address user complaints that a high-ranking page about someone in their search results is outrageous through some defined process, or on an ad hoc basis, or not at all?
  2. How should Google handle situations where someone complains that a high-ranking page about them contains malicious, defamatory, privacy-invading, grotesque, or otherwise inappropriate content? If it were up to you, or us collectively, how would we (or would we?) set up a process to protect people from this sort of thing — a sort of Internet-wide BLP policy, I suppose, though presumably to be applied only in extreme cases — without giving Google, which many regard as having too much power already, the actual or perceived role of censors of what can and can't be found on the Internet?
For "Google" of course one can substitute any search engine; I mention them specifically because they are the best-known. (I'm not familiar with Bing, but to the extent we're told that they do not index the articles referred to, I'm curious what in their algorithm or parameters causes them not to.)

Thoughts?


This is an important issue, and I started to comment, but it's a waste of time and energy doing that in a closed forum. Maybe the generic part of the topic could be taken up on the main board?

Jon Awbrey


I hope that I haven't violated any WR rules about copying content from a closed forum, but I believe I have expunged any content that might tread on the privacy of anyone who published sensitive content to the original thread.

Google does have a non-DMCA mechanism for requesting that content be removed from their indexed roster of search engine results pages (SERPs). However, the content that you complain about must simultaneously offend THREE matters of concern. Here is the process:
  1. Click the "Give us feedback" link at the bottom of the SERP
  2. Click the "I had a bad experience with a website I found on Google" radio button
  3. That will materialize a link to "One or more of the results were inappropriate"
  4. Click that link, and a pop-up window will appear, which includes a link to Google's Webpage Removal Request Tool
  5. Select "New removal request", then enter the URL of the problematic site
  6. Then you get an interesting array of reasons why you want the site taken off the SERPs
  7. Probably the most appropriate one for an ED-related issue is "The website owner won't remove personal content"
  8. Then you get four more links to choose from, and it's probably best to select "Your full name or the name of your business appearing on an adult content site that's spamming Google's search results"
  9. Then you have to attest that the page violates all of these three parameters:
  10. The page contains my full name or the name of my business
  11. The page contains adult content
  12. The page is spam because it's violating Google's webmaster quality guidelines
  13. The final step is to wait and wait while a (probably) Indian or Filipino customer support person with 8th-grade English-language skills determines whether they will spend 30 seconds or 45 seconds to decline your request.
  14. Actually, the final step is to watch Google take in $26.5 billion in revenue and $6.5 billion in net income in 2009, and wait to see how much they best those figures in 2010.

I'm not saying what my personal experience has been using this Google feature, but let's just say I'll let you know the day I ever experience a pleasant customer service interaction with paid Google staff.
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A User
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 1:30pm
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My personal experience with Google is that they don't - their usual Help forum response to users is 1) ask the website webmasters of the offending content to 'nicely' to remove it 2) If they don't there is nothing Google can do.

Even using the only other Google option of requesting a cache deletion is only temporary. Unless the webmaster of the site blocks spidering, the cache will reemerge again next time Google spiders the site.

Bing and Yahoo have no facilities for deleting offensive content by request.
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Jon Awbrey
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 1:38pm
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The question of what a responsible business should do is a good one.

But when it comes to e-quating ED, Google, and WP — let's be clear about the Big Diff between an Independent Free Press and a Tax-Advantaged, False Advertising, Perversely Un-Charitable, Self-Described “Social Movement”, lest we be chasing yet another kettle of red herrings forever.

Jon Awbrey
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thekohser
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 5:59pm
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A responsible business (say, a search engine, or an "officially" licensed contractor of that search engine) could manage this process quite effectively, and even turn a profit. They could ask the offended party to deposit an amount, say $25, to an escrow account. The owner of the website with the questionable content would also be contacted and notified that a complaint has been made, and they may either (1) remove the content within 30 days, or (2) dispute the complaint by likewise posting $25 to the escrow account.

The arbitrator then takes $20 of the escrow account to pay for a live, human assessment of the evidence from both sides. When the arbitrator makes their ruling, the remaining $30 goes to the winner of the dispute... a profit of $5 for their troubles. The loser loses $25.

Of course, if the owner of the site that is hosting the defamatory content cannot be found, or doesn't show up, then the search engine returns $20 of the complainant's $25, and the page is no longer indexed by the search engine. The offending party is, according to free speech and all that, still entitled to host the offending content. They're simply not entitled to have the content served up in the search engine's results pages.
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Daniel Brandt
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 6:42pm
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Once I logged into Google's Webmaster Tools for wikipedia-watch.org and discovered that there was a remove-page request from some teenager in Switzerland who didn't like his hivemind entry. The complaint was made months earlier. (Nothing got removed from Google's index, obviously.) In other words, Google did not even bother to send an email to my Gmail account associated with wikipedia-watch.org in Webmaster Tools. The bottom line is that Google sometimes pretends to take action, but only to the extent that it is "scalable" (Google's favorite word). Even then if you are trying to complain, you have to be quite persistent just to get to the right robot at the Googleplex so that anything at all happens.

Now if it is a government making the request, that's a different matter. Google no longer links to the extremely racist "Aboriginal" article on Encyclopedia Dramatica on their www.google.com.au site, because Australia has a law that addresses racist content on the Internet. Google might be held liable under Australian law, for all I know.

For Google, it's all about covering your ass so that you can keep getting rich off of ads.
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anthony
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 8:31pm
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QUOTE(thekohser @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 5:59pm) *

A responsible business (say, a search engine, or an "officially" licensed contractor of that search engine) could manage this process quite effectively, and even turn a profit. They could ask the offended party to deposit an amount, say $25, to an escrow account. The owner of the website with the questionable content would also be contacted and notified that a complaint has been made, and they may either (1) remove the content within 30 days, or (2) dispute the complaint by likewise posting $25 to the escrow account.


What if the content is anonymous and the author doesn't want to reveal her identity?

EDIT: It is an interesting idea. I wonder if Wikipedia could use it for content disputes. Another problem (or one problem, if the anonymity one can be solved) is that $40 $20 probably isn't anywhere near enough to pay for arbitration unless the issue is very very very simple.

This post has been edited by anthony: Fri 24th September 2010, 1:27am
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thekohser
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 8:34pm
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QUOTE(anthony @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 4:31pm) *

QUOTE(thekohser @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 5:59pm) *

A responsible business (say, a search engine, or an "officially" licensed contractor of that search engine) could manage this process quite effectively, and even turn a profit. They could ask the offended party to deposit an amount, say $25, to an escrow account. The owner of the website with the questionable content would also be contacted and notified that a complaint has been made, and they may either (1) remove the content within 30 days, or (2) dispute the complaint by likewise posting $25 to the escrow account.


What if the content is anonymous and the author doesn't want to reveal her identity?


I think I covered that here:

QUOTE
Of course, if the owner of the site that is hosting the defamatory content cannot be found, or doesn't show up, then the search engine returns $20 of the complainant's $25, and the page is no longer indexed by the search engine. The offending party is, according to free speech and all that, still entitled to host the offending content. They're simply not entitled to have the content served up in the search engine's results pages.


"Owner of the site" would also include "Anonymous content author who doesn't want to reveal her identity".

Did SlimVirgin ask you to post that?
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anthony
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 8:38pm
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QUOTE(thekohser @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 8:34pm) *

QUOTE(anthony @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 4:31pm) *

QUOTE(thekohser @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 5:59pm) *

A responsible business (say, a search engine, or an "officially" licensed contractor of that search engine) could manage this process quite effectively, and even turn a profit. They could ask the offended party to deposit an amount, say $25, to an escrow account. The owner of the website with the questionable content would also be contacted and notified that a complaint has been made, and they may either (1) remove the content within 30 days, or (2) dispute the complaint by likewise posting $25 to the escrow account.


What if the content is anonymous and the author doesn't want to reveal her identity?


I think I covered that here:

QUOTE
Of course, if the owner of the site that is hosting the defamatory content cannot be found, or doesn't show up, then the search engine returns $20 of the complainant's $25, and the page is no longer indexed by the search engine. The offending party is, according to free speech and all that, still entitled to host the offending content. They're simply not entitled to have the content served up in the search engine's results pages.


"Owner of the site" would also include "Anonymous content author who doesn't want to reveal her identity".

Did SlimVirgin ask you to post that?


No, and I don't think that it's acceptable to ask Google to stop linking to anonymous content. Yes, anonymous authors aren't entitled to have Google link to their content. But I'd say it's clearly in the best interests of Google to do so.

OTOH, maybe they could have another third party which would handle anonymous payments. Along with the payment could be a cryptographic key which allowed the anonymous party to submit evidence anonymously.

Of course, I still say $40 $20 is nowhere near enough money for this.

This post has been edited by anthony: Fri 24th September 2010, 1:27am
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anthony
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 8:45pm
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I still think the best Google can do is to put a warning next to the link when there is a complaint, unless the defamation or lack thereof is so blatant that there's no question as to which party is right.

This post has been edited by anthony: Thu 23rd September 2010, 8:46pm
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Cyclopia
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 8:53pm
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Help me understand why a search engine should be held liable for the content of the page it finds, instead of the author of the page itself.
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Michaeldsuarez
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 8:55pm
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QUOTE(Daniel Brandt @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 7:42pm) *
Now if it is a government making the request, that's a different matter. Google no longer links to the extremely racist "Aboriginal" article on Encyclopedia Dramatica on their www.google.com.au site, because Australia has a law that addresses racist content on the Internet. Google might be held liable under Australian law, for all I know.


Yet Google Australia doesn't block white supremacist / "white survivalist" sites like "stormfront".
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Milton Roe
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 8:59pm
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QUOTE(Cyclopia @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 1:53pm) *

Help me understand why a search engine should be held liable for the content of the page it finds, instead of the author of the page itself.

Help me understand why the Google "complete the search word" helper doesn't actually work for the most common terms on the web, but has been censored in its suggestions. It won't help you find any search term or phrase with "fuck" in it, or even anything with "anal" "penis" or "vagina". Oddly, "clitoris" contains much useful help, perhaps operating on the assumption that people need as much help finding out stuff about the clitorus as can be given them.

But somebody at Google has to decide these things. Obviously, they did. Do you think they should not have?
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Cyclopia
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:04pm
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QUOTE(Milton Roe @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:59pm) *

QUOTE(Cyclopia @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 1:53pm) *

Help me understand why a search engine should be held liable for the content of the page it finds, instead of the author of the page itself.

Help me understand why the Google "complete the search word" helper doesn't actually work for the most common terms on the web, but has been censored in its suggestions. It won't help you find any search term or phrase with "fuck" in it, or even anything with "anal" "penis" or "vagina". Oddly, "clitoris" contains much useful help, perhaps operating on the assumption that people need as much help finding out stuff about the clitorus as can be given them.

But somebody at Google has to decide these things. Obviously, they did. Do you think they should not have?


What has this to do with my question?
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anthony
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:05pm
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QUOTE(Cyclopia @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:04pm) *

QUOTE(Milton Roe @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:59pm) *

QUOTE(Cyclopia @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 1:53pm) *

Help me understand why a search engine should be held liable for the content of the page it finds, instead of the author of the page itself.

Help me understand why the Google "complete the search word" helper doesn't actually work for the most common terms on the web, but has been censored in its suggestions. It won't help you find any search term or phrase with "fuck" in it, or even anything with "anal" "penis" or "vagina". Oddly, "clitoris" contains much useful help, perhaps operating on the assumption that people need as much help finding out stuff about the clitorus as can be given them.

But somebody at Google has to decide these things. Obviously, they did. Do you think they should not have?


What has this to do with my question?


What does your "question" have to do with this thread?

This post has been edited by anthony: Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:06pm
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Zoloft
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:09pm
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QUOTE(Cyclopia @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 2:04pm) *

QUOTE(Milton Roe @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:59pm) *

QUOTE(Cyclopia @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 1:53pm) *

Help me understand why a search engine should be held liable for the content of the page it finds, instead of the author of the page itself.

Help me understand why the Google "complete the search word" helper doesn't actually work for the most common terms on the web, but has been censored in its suggestions. It won't help you find any search term or phrase with "fuck" in it, or even anything with "anal" "penis" or "vagina". Oddly, "clitoris" contains much useful help, perhaps operating on the assumption that people need as much help finding out stuff about the clitorus as can be given them.

But somebody at Google has to decide these things. Obviously, they did. Do you think they should not have?


What has this to do with my question?

*picks up a few empty beer cans and a crumpled paper bag*

Welcome to web forums, where you can't control what people say in response to your questions.
It's kinda like real life in that respect.

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Milton Roe
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:10pm
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QUOTE(Cyclopia @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 2:04pm) *

QUOTE(Milton Roe @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:59pm) *

QUOTE(Cyclopia @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 1:53pm) *

Help me understand why a search engine should be held liable for the content of the page it finds, instead of the author of the page itself.

Help me understand why the Google "complete the search word" helper doesn't actually work for the most common terms on the web, but has been censored in its suggestions. It won't help you find any search term or phrase with "fuck" in it, or even anything with "anal" "penis" or "vagina". Oddly, "clitoris" contains much useful help, perhaps operating on the assumption that people need as much help finding out stuff about the clitorus as can be given them.

But somebody at Google has to decide these things. Obviously, they did. Do you think they should not have?


What has this to do with my question?

You'll have to ask the Google Corporation that. If you use Google in Italian (something I'm not sure actually exists), does it give you all the ways to use and find testa di cazzo, even before you complete the phrase? In normal English Google (prehaps the only Google for all I know), it actually does give you the Italian suggestion! (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/smile.gif) But you'll not get far with "dickhea..". Even though there's really nothing in English after dickhe... BUT "dickhead", Google will never tell you that.

Apparently English is a language which comes under special sensitivity treatment at Google. You'll have to experiment with Italian to see if that's true there.
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Cyclopia
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:23pm
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I guess there is a huge misunderstanding here.

The topic is "Deleting defamatory content from web searches". So I ask: while I perfectly understand why one would want defamatory content to be removed from search engines, I don't understand why removal of content isn't primarily asked to the website (or the webhost, if the webmaster doesn't complain). Search engines should not have responsibility for what the sites they link contain.


Google can do whatever it wants with the "complete the search word" feature. But this doesn't seem related to the topic at all. It has nothing to do with legal liability, or with search engine results.

This post has been edited by Cyclopia: Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:24pm
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thekohser
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:28pm
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QUOTE(Cyclopia @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 4:53pm) *

Help me understand why a search engine should be held liable for the content of the page it finds, instead of the author of the page itself.

How did I know that Cyclopia would have trouble engaging his brain on this one?

My friend, Cyclopia, some irresponsible websites allow unidentified people to publish defamatory content, while at the same time hiding who is even the owner or legal agent of the site itself. In other words, they are acting outside the reach of the law. Defamation should have recourse in the bounds of the law.

Maybe you don't like law, but I do, and billions of other people do. It keeps their homes from being burned down by lawless mobs, and their children being dragged off into slavery or rape rooms. You may wish we lived that way, but that's your problem.

Now, about a Google being "liable" for what it displays, we never said that Google should be "liable", a legal premise. I think we're saying that Google "ought to be a good corporate citizen" and, because it's in its best interests, seek to provide good information, not defamation, to consumers.

One last point -- Encyclopedia Dramatica doesn't run Google AdSense. Therefore, Google would actually benefit profit-wise from charging people $5 per requested page taken off-index on that domain, as I proposed, rather than sticking to this ridiculous status quo of casual indifference with "request assistance" tools that lead to an empty desk in Manila.

I hope you understand now, Cyclopia. (You have no experience in business, do you?)
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Milton Roe
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:29pm
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QUOTE(Cyclopia @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 2:23pm) *

Google can do whatever it wants with the "complete the search word" feature. But this doesn't seem related to the topic at all. It has nothing to do with legal liability, or with search engine results.

Oh, I think Google's fiddling with the "complete the search word" feature does have to do with legal liability. Since there's no way to tell the age of the people using it, Google has a hard time completing certain words and phrases, by suggestion, for 12 year-olds.
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anthony
post Thu 23rd September 2010, 10:01pm
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QUOTE(thekohser @ Thu 23rd September 2010, 9:28pm) *

Now, about a Google being "liable" for what it displays, we never said that Google should be "liable", a legal premise.


Exactly.

QUOTE

I think we're saying that Google "ought to be a good corporate citizen" and, because it's in its best interests, seek to provide good information, not defamation, to consumers.


Yes.

But that means they need to be careful not to allow bias in their removal processes. Just removing links to anonymous content simply because someone lent them $25 and asked nicely, would introduce far too much bias into the search engine, in my opinion. (It also might wind up being expensive, as they have to process the payment, hold on to it in a legally separated escrow account, search for the content author, and return the payment, multiplied by who knows how many million links. And they probably can't take part of the $25 or even put it in their general funds, as that might amount to extortion - requiring payment to remove defamatory content.)

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