A court ruling in Europe allowing citizens to request search engines take down questionable content about them on the Internet could create a new business industry.
Andy Donaldson, owner of Hit Search, a U.K. online marketing agency that caters to individuals and companies who want to have their online mentions monitored, reported they gained more customers after the court reinforced the "right to be forgotten" rule. Thousands of potential customers per day inquire about how they can benefit on the new ruling.
"It's a whole new business opportunity for us," Donaldson told the New York Times. "People want to protect how they appear in search results."
Google received about 12,000 online requests related to the new privacy ruling within the first 24 hours of reinforcement, at a rate of 20 requests per minute. Many questioned the effectiveness of the process. Google CEO Larry Page also expressed his frustration in an interview with the Financial Times.
Another company, Reputation VIP, which offers online reputation protection for $4,000 a month, also reported an increase in business inquiries.
Reputation VIP chief executive Bertrand Girin beefed up a new product called Forget.me, targeting individuals who wanted to remove contents about them. Since the online submission began, his company has requested the removal of nearly 7,600 Internet pages. Most of the requests came from customers based in Britain, France and Germany.
"We saw an opportunity. When Google put its form online, we saw there could be a lack of understanding for some people about how to submit requests," said Mr. Girin to New York Times.
The "right to be forgotten" rule serves as a launch pad for an emerging industry-reputation management. Google does not charge for forms submitted online but most people prefer to submit their requests to third-party companies, then pay for their services, due to privacy issues.
