Information removal google – Reputation management

Get information off Google search results

How to remove information from Google search results depends on whether you have control of the page that hosts the information.

If you control the page

If the content is on a website that you control, or is managed by an account that you control (for example, in your Blogger page), or you are the verified site owner in Google Search Console, here is how to remove your content from Google search results.

If the source page no longer exists (or is inaccessible) on the web

If the page where the information came from is no longer on the web, or it is now protected by a login, file a URL removal request. (Requires you to be logged in with a Google account.)

Why would I want to remove my name from Google search results?

There are plenty of reasons to remove information about yourself from Google results. For one thing, people sometimes post outright misinformation onto the web, and people need to delete it to avoid misunderstandings.

In other cases, people don’t like their personal information floating around the web. Our postal addresses, mobile numbers, emails, and other key snippets of data can easily end up in public searches. This can be a big help for criminals who want to assume our identities.

In other cases, you may want to reduce the awareness of your personal history. We all do things we regret, and it’s unfair to carry around the stigma attached to these mistakes for the rest of your life. By learning how to remove personal information from internet sources, you can wipe the slate clean and move on.

Finally, as we noted earlier, some companies like to carry out in-depth vetting of applicants. So if you’ve expressed controversial opinions in the past, you may want to remove them from search results.

How to remove personal information from Google results

When we talk about removing personal data from Google, there are a couple of considerations to think about. Firstly, you may want to remove actual websites (or URLs). Secondly, you’ll probably want to erase the information that Google holds about your search history. These are two separate challenges, but it makes sense to deal with them both.

1. Remove outdated URLs from the internet

Let’s say you know a site which holds information about your life, and you’d like to make it inaccessible to Google users. In many cases, you can actually apply to the search giant, and the site can be removed as “outdated.” This doesn’t apply to currently operative sites – but does apply to a huge volume of URLs that appear in Google searches. Here’s how to do it:

Use Google’s search engine to find the URL (website address) of the site you think is outdated or inaccurate.
Use this URL removal tool to report the site address as outdated
Google will then assess the request. If the site is cached and not part of the currently visible web, it will be removed from future search results.

2. Make a legal removal request to delete personal data

Google doesn’t want every user to apply to remove URLs containing personal data. And there are public interest reasons not to allow every request to be applied. But in recent years, the search company has expanded the “right to be forgotten.”

Here’s how to start the removal process:

Work out a list of URLs that you’d like to remove.
Head to the “Removing Content from Google” tool which can be found here.
Choose “Web search” from the menu.
Choose “I would like to remove personal information from Google search results.”
Now, you’ll have a range of choices. The most comprehensive course of action is to choose to “delist information” according to European Union GDPR regulations.
Now, press the “continue here” link at the bottom of the page.
Complete the (extensive) legal form for making a “right to be forgotten” request. This will take some time, but it’s necessary to ensure that Google removes every site from its index.
Remember to check the “I’m not a robot” box, and press “Submit.” Your request will be processed and Google should provide swift feedback about the extent of deletions.

3. How to remove personal information that Google holds about you

The other side to the coin of protecting personal data is requesting the data held by Google about your identity. And if you’re serious about knowing how to remove personal information from Internet sources, this is absolutely essential. Here’s how to do it: