Afghanistan: European court: Google must yield on personal info --- AMSTERDAM — In a landmark ruling that could rock the Internet search-engine industry, Europe’s highest court said Tuesday that people are entitled to some control over what pops up when their name is Googled. -- The Court of Justice of the European Union said Google must listen and sometimes comply when individuals ask the search giant to remove links to newspaper articles or websites containing information about them. -- The ruling applies to EU citizens and all search engines in Europe, including Yahoo and Microsoft’s Bing. It remains to be seen whether it will change the way Google and its rivals operate in the U.S. and elsewhere around the world. -- Nor is it clear exactly how the court envisions Google and others handling complaints, which could prove to be a logistical headache if large numbers of people start demanding that information about themselves be removed. -- While some digital-rights experts welcomed the decision as a victory for privacy rights, others warned it could lead to online censorship. -- Google said it was disappointed by the ruling — which cannot be appealed — but was still studying its implications. -- The Mountain View, California, company has long argued that people with complaints about Web searches containing outdated or otherwise objectionable information should take it up with the websites. -- The EU, which would be the world’s largest economy if its 28 countries were counted as one, has a population of over 500 million. -- The case was referred to the European Court from Spain’s National Court, which asked for advice in the case of Mario Costeja, a Spaniard who found a search on his name turned up links to a notice that his property was due to be auctioned because of an unpaid welfare debt. The notice had been published in a Spanish newspaper in 1998, and was tracked by Google’s robots when the newspaper digitized its archive. -- Costeja argued that the debt had long since been settled, and he asked the Spanish privacy agency to have the reference removed. In 2010, the agency agreed, but Google refused and took the matter to court, saying it should not be asked to censor material that had been legally published by the newspaper. -- “It’s a great relief to be shown that you were right when you have fought for your ideas. It’s a joy,” Costeja told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. “If Google was great before, it’s perfect now, because there are game rules to go by.” -- He said that “ordinary people will know where they have to go” to complain about bad or old information that turns up on a Google search. -- Costeja’s case will now return to Spain for final judgment. There are about 200 others in the Spanish court system, some of which may still prove difficult to decide. For instance, one involves a plastic surgeon who wants mentions of a botched operation removed from Google’s results. -- In its ruling, the European Court said people may address requests directly to the operator of the search engine, “which must then duly examine its merits.” -- Some limited forms of a “right to be forgotten” exist in the U.S. and elsewhere — for example, in regard to crimes committed by minors or bankruptcy regulations, both of which usually require that records be expunged in some way. However, the burden falls on the publisher of the information, usually a government — not on search engines.