Google settles online abuse case out of court

In a move that could have far-reaching consequences for how search engines handle information, Google has agreed to an out-of-court settlement with a former banker who wanted to permanently block "vile and abusive" material posted about him online.

The High Court was set to hear the case of former banker, Daniel Hegglin, an employee at Morgan Stanley for 24 years, who complained that he had been subjected to defamation online that had labelled him a murderer, a paedophile and a member of the Ku Klux Klan.

The exact details of the settlement were not revealed, but an agreed statement was read out in court.

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"The settlement includes significant efforts on Google's part to remove the abusive material from Google-hosted websites and from its search results," said Hegglin’s barrister, Hugh Tomlinson QC.

"Mr Hegglin will now concentrate his energies on bringing the persons responsible for this campaign of harassment to justice."

Google had previously asked the businessman to provide a list of abusive links that he wished to have removed, but Hegglin's lawyers argued that the tech company needed to do more, the BBC reports.

Tomlinson said that any efforts to deal with the links individually would be like "playing a game of whack-a-mole" as no matter how many pages were taken down, others would appear. Hegglin said that at the time the case was due to go to court, the abuse had spread to more than 3,600 websites.

In May this year, the European Court controversially ruled that outdated links about people should be removed from search engine results, arguing that individuals had a "right to be forgotten", but Hegglin's case had been initiated prior to that ruling, The Independent reports.

During an earlier hearing, Google's lawyer had said the dispute had "every look of a test case with enormous consequences".

BBC legal affairs correspondent, Clive Coleman said that the case was "about arguably something much more important than the right to be forgotten" as it concerned the circulation of abusive posts rather than information that was simply old or irrelevant. Hegglin's case demonstrated how "anyone can post malicious material anonymously online, which can have a devastating effect on the life of the victim"