SPECIAL COLLECTION OF THE CASE LAW ON FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION Although a person had the right to have information de-indexed in certain circumstances, the Supreme Court of Japan held that the individual in this case could not oblige Google to do so because of the public interest in the availability of information pertaining to child prostitution, and the narrow dissemination of the information in question. Finally, an interesting case came up in India, this time not involving the perpetrators of crimes, but victims. In The Case of the Rape Survivor’s Right to Be Forgotten, the Kerala High Court ordered the Respondent, IndianKanoon.com, to remove the name of the Petitioner, a rape survivor, from a judgment in a rape case which had been uploaded on its website. The Petitioner also requested that search engines including Google and Yahoo remove search results about the case that mentioned her name. The Court recognized the “right to be forgotten” and the confidentiality of the Petitioner under Sec. 228A of the Indian Penal Code as well as her right to privacy and a dignified life enshrined under Art. 21 of the Constitution of India. The Court did so to protect the petitioner’s right to reputation and privacy under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution. A similar decision—involving a victim—reached a similar conclusion, this time in Turkey. In MT v. OY, HTG, MA & A. Ltd., The General Assembly of Civil Chambers acknowledged the existence of the “right to be forgotten” in Turkey, and extended its application to non-digital mediums. The case concerned a victim of sexual assault whose name had been published in a legal textbook. The textbook included the judgment of the criminal trial, which resulted in the perpetrator’s conviction. The victim argued that the inclusion of her name violated her privacy, caused her psychological harm, and damaged her reputation. The General Assembly of Civil Chambers ruled for the plaintiff and awarded her non-pecuniary damages, citing the lack of public interest in publishing her name. 4. Reputation and Honor Many cases where the “right to be forgotten” has been invoked are based on rationales that ground it in the plaintiff’s rights to reputation and honor. These cases follow similar patterns: old convictions that had been legitimately covered by the press re-emerge when newspapers archives were converted into a digital format and were made available on the Internet. In Biancardi v. Italy, the ECtHR considered that de-indexing requests can proceed and do not violate Article 10. The applicant was an editor-in-chief of an online newspaper that published an article describing a fight at a restaurant and the criminal proceedings that ensued. The person described in the article requested the applicant to remove and de-index the article, which was not granted. The Italian courts held that, by not de-indexing the article, the publisher had made it easily accessible online for a significant period and violated the applicant’s right to reputation protected by Article 8. The ECtHR upheld the decision. It also upheld the non-pecuniary damages granted to the applicant against the editor, in consideration of the sensitive nature of the personal data published. It found that publishing supplementary information would be insufficient to balance the applicant’s rights under Article 8 against the publisher’s rights under Article 10. 18