Google courting big trouble
Search engine giant under fire for revealing names of crime victims
OTTAWA — New and startling evidence of Google’s ability to possibly defeat court-ordered publication bans has emerged as an Ottawa law firm prepares a class-action lawsuit against the search engine giant.
The Ottawa Citizen has found that, in two high-profile Ontario cases, Google searches aimed at finding online news coverage of the trials will return “related searches” that include the names of individuals shielded by the courts.
These inadvertent disclosures provide fresh examples of how Google could be undermining court-ordered publication bans put in place to protect crime victims and young offenders.
Meanwhile, Ottawa lawyer Michael Crystal said he intends to launch a class-action lawsuit on behalf of those whose right to remain anonymous may have been breached by Google search algorithms.
“I am quite concerned this violation may create a chill in the court process if not confronted,” Crystal said. “Complainants in sexual assault matters often come forward on the basis that their identities will be protected.”
In recent weeks, the Citizen has discovered that Google’s powerful search engine can link a protected name to court coverage, and court coverage to a protected name.
In one high-profile Ontario case, anyone using common search terms to retrieve news stories about the trial produces a list of “related searches” that includes the name of a protected sexual assault victim. In another much-publicized case, the “related searches” list includes the court-protected name of a child abuser.
It means that someone who doesn’t know the protected name of a victim or offender can, in certain cases, be linked to them through the “related searches” function.
Google’s list of related searches often appear at the bottom of a search page in dark blue hyperlinks.
The tool was first unveiled by Google in 2008. In an official blog from the company’s Google News team, it was promoted as a way for web surfers to browse the news, “perhaps finding connections between stories that you hadn’t seen.”
Google Canada officials reiterated Friday that they will act on individual complaints and remove search results that violate local laws.
The latest developments follow a Citizen story that revealed Google’s search engine can link the protected names of young offenders and victims to online media coverage.
Computer experts believe such links are an unintended consequence of math-based algorithms that can produce results informed by what other people have searched for online.
Google handles more than 3.5 billion searches a day, and dominates the search engine landscape.