"No one should be able to curtain-twitch into your past. This is why you have the Right to be Forgotten."
Joy Martin - GDPR Submissions Manager, Internet Erasure Ltd
Joy Martin - GDPR Submissions Manager, Internet Erasure Ltd
Remove Criminal Convictions from Search Results
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The Right to be Forgotten (GDPR Article 17), means that YOU can apply to PERMANENTLY BLOCK your criminal convictions from search results. |
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Stopping Enforced Disclosure by Google with the Right to Erasure (aka the Right to be Forgotten). Discover in this 20 minute video how private individuals can apply to search engines to block historic articles under their name, as well as directly to publishers, to request them to delete articles. There are many legitimate reasons for removing articles, blocking news reports, photographs and other links from search results, you can read more about these on The Information Commissioner's website https://ico.org.uk/your-data-matters/online/internet-search-results/
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The Internet Never Forgets:
When we consider that 11 million (1 in 6) people in the UK live with the label of 'criminal' or 'ex-offender', there are growing calls for greater inclusion for people with criminal records, particularly where someone has made serious progress in living a crime-free life.
Far more important, however, than reforming the framework around criminal records and disclosure, is the archiving, or anonymising, of contemporaneous online reports and commentary, and their easy accessibility via search engines.
Almost all landlords, employers, clients, potential associates, neighbours and social contacts use search engines and social media to research people, this is now as instinctive as any other business process.
Having completed a thousand Personal Disclosure Statements alongside, and on behalf of work-seekers, I can say with certainty that addressing search engine results, historic speculation and untested evidence, has become more important than explaining the offence itself.
The Right to Erasure aka Right to Be Forgotten (Article 17 GDPR) gives the power to request the removal of outdated, inaccurate, excessive and/or irrelevant material, particularly where it is having a detrimental or disproportionate effect on someone's ability to live a normal life.
Unfortunately, this right is sometimes countered with the rote phrase "It is in the public interest". Such responses can be argued however and there is much to be gained by persisting with the search engines themselves and with the Information Commissioner (ICO).
I believe that if we really want people to rebuild their lives and contribute to society, we must address the legislative gaps around the continuous online publishing of criminal records and the associated backgrounds.
We have now entered an era where someone can make a mistake, break the law, be punished, and pay the price that those who are most qualified to decide, the judges, have said they must pay. Despite having served their time, however, they and their family continue to suffer for their crime because the historic concept of 'today's news being tomorrow's chip shop paper' no longer applies and THE INTERNET NEVER FORGETS.
You may ask, “Aren’t you curious, wouldn’t you like to know about someone's past? Don't we have a right to know?”
IF IT IS ESSENTIAL TO KNOW, we have access to:
IF IT IS NOT ESSENTIAL TO KNOW then we simply should not know.
The opportunity to prejudge someone based on their past should not be available without appropriate checks and within a balanced disclosure system, otherwise we are all as a society undermining the entire purpose of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act.
Whatever happened to someone paying their debt to society?
There must be a timescale by which one-sided media reports are archived and third-party keyboard warriors are silenced so that people can at least have a chance to build a life and contribute to society.
#Article17 #FewerVictims #DeleteArticles #RightToErasure #SpentConviction #ReturningCitizens #PrisonersFamilies #PrisonersArePeople #RightToBeForgotten #TheRightToBeForgotten #CriminalRecordsDisclosure
When we consider that 11 million (1 in 6) people in the UK live with the label of 'criminal' or 'ex-offender', there are growing calls for greater inclusion for people with criminal records, particularly where someone has made serious progress in living a crime-free life.
Far more important, however, than reforming the framework around criminal records and disclosure, is the archiving, or anonymising, of contemporaneous online reports and commentary, and their easy accessibility via search engines.
Almost all landlords, employers, clients, potential associates, neighbours and social contacts use search engines and social media to research people, this is now as instinctive as any other business process.
Having completed a thousand Personal Disclosure Statements alongside, and on behalf of work-seekers, I can say with certainty that addressing search engine results, historic speculation and untested evidence, has become more important than explaining the offence itself.
The Right to Erasure aka Right to Be Forgotten (Article 17 GDPR) gives the power to request the removal of outdated, inaccurate, excessive and/or irrelevant material, particularly where it is having a detrimental or disproportionate effect on someone's ability to live a normal life.
Unfortunately, this right is sometimes countered with the rote phrase "It is in the public interest". Such responses can be argued however and there is much to be gained by persisting with the search engines themselves and with the Information Commissioner (ICO).
I believe that if we really want people to rebuild their lives and contribute to society, we must address the legislative gaps around the continuous online publishing of criminal records and the associated backgrounds.
We have now entered an era where someone can make a mistake, break the law, be punished, and pay the price that those who are most qualified to decide, the judges, have said they must pay. Despite having served their time, however, they and their family continue to suffer for their crime because the historic concept of 'today's news being tomorrow's chip shop paper' no longer applies and THE INTERNET NEVER FORGETS.
You may ask, “Aren’t you curious, wouldn’t you like to know about someone's past? Don't we have a right to know?”
IF IT IS ESSENTIAL TO KNOW, we have access to:
- The Disclosure and Barring service (DBS formerly CRB) https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/disclosure-and-barring-service
- The Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme (also known as Clare's Law) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/domestic-abuse-bill-2020-factsheets/domestic-violence-disclosure-scheme-factsheet)
- The Sex Offender Disclosure Scheme (also known as Sarah's Law), https://www.gov.uk/guidance/find-out-if-a-person-has-a-record-for-child-sexual-offences,
- A growing range of additional court orders including Serious Crime Prevention Orders https://www.cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance/serious-crime-prevention-orders Sexual Harm Prevention Orders https://www.cps.gov.uk/legal-guidance/rape-and-sexual-abuse-chapter-14-sexual-harm-prevention-orders-shpos and other ancillary orders.
- Multi-agency Monitoring and Public Protection Arrangements https://www.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/hmiprobation/research/the-evidence-base-probation/specific-types-of-delivery/mappa/ including a range of licence conditions and reporting requirements.
There is no evidence that public protection needs have ever been compromised by a lack of available disclosure, or that the continuous publication of out-of-date material has ever led to fewer victims of crime. On the contrary, historic and excessive negative publicity leads to greater exclusion from employment opportunities, traditional housing supply and from active participation in their communities. It is exactly this exclusion that leads to criminal activity (as well as putting people at risk of vigilantism) * Ref: "If criminals can change then so should society and our prisons"
IF IT IS NOT ESSENTIAL TO KNOW then we simply should not know.
The opportunity to prejudge someone based on their past should not be available without appropriate checks and within a balanced disclosure system, otherwise we are all as a society undermining the entire purpose of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act.
Whatever happened to someone paying their debt to society?
There must be a timescale by which one-sided media reports are archived and third-party keyboard warriors are silenced so that people can at least have a chance to build a life and contribute to society.
#Article17 #FewerVictims #DeleteArticles #RightToErasure #SpentConviction #ReturningCitizens #PrisonersFamilies #PrisonersArePeople #RightToBeForgotten #TheRightToBeForgotten #CriminalRecordsDisclosure
