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February 7, 2017

Paedophile loses bid to be removed from Google

The Japanese man appealed to the Supreme Court in the country for similar protections to Europe's 'right to be forgotten'.

The court ruled that deleting the search results would violate the principle of freedom of speech.

The right to be forgotten was a concept enshrined in European law after a Spanish man, who did not want his name linked to an 11-year-old report about the forced sale of a property, took his case to the European Court of Justice.

He successfully argued that the links to the report breached his fundamental human rights.

The Japanese man had also tried to issue an injunction against Google ordering it to delete the search results about his arrest in a child prostitution case.

The injunction was first allowed by a local court and then blocked by the Tokyo High Court, which said he had no right to order the links be deleted.

The final decision went to the Supreme Court which, while not mentioning the EU's right to be forgotten rules, set strict conditions on what, if anything, can be deleted.

It said it should depend on the degree of damage caused to privacy, how easy it is to carry out a search and the social importance of displaying the search result.

The internet search results about the man's arrest related to case dating back to 2011.

He was later convicted of child prostitution and pornography offences.

The Asahi Shimbun newspaper reported he was held for paying a female high school student to conduct an indecent act and was fined 500,000 yen (£3,600).

"Child prostitution is prohibited by the penal code and is a target of strong social condemnation," Asahi Shimbun quoted the court bench as saying in its ruling.

"Removal can be demanded only when value of privacy protection clearly exceeds freedom of expression of search sites," the ruling added.

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