Google has announced several key changes to make its search platform safer for users by giving more control to South Africans (and other countries) over what personal information appears in results.
The internet giant said that it is bundling a host of new features that will allow users to remove their personal information from search and tackle explicit material posted without consent.
Google said that it is implementing major updates to this tool, making it easier for users to remove their personal contact information from Search. The tool will proactively monitor the web for results containing users’ contact information and enable immediate removal requests. Users will also be notified when new results appear containing their contact info.
Why this is also positive, is that it can also be difficult to get information removed from actual websites which are in many different countries. So being able to also just remove the indexed link, does help quite a bit as there is no longer something pointing most users to that information associated with you.
So will this be possible with DDG and Brave search too? I know some may decry the freedom of search is being encroached here, but it should also be remembered that it does often happen that the private information being published is also not legal. Just today, when testing this out I discovered my private cellphone number published (I know from the wording with it, that it was obtained from very likely a banking or insurance source, and my permission was not given for it to be published). In many countries, the right to privacy is also entrenched in their laws. The right to know does not usually override the right to privacy that individuals have.