German court rules Google isn't required to vet websites
Do search engines have an obligation to make sure every website obeys the law before listing it? They certainly don't in Germany. The country's Federal Court of Justice has ruled that Google isn't required to vet sites for defamatory material before they appear in its results. Two people had demanded that Google create filters to avoid showing sites where the complainants had been verbally attacked, but the court determined that search firms like Google only had to take action when notified that a site has clearly violated someone's rights. Asking a search provider to vet each and every site would make it "impossible" to get much use out of the internet, according to the court. There's an "unmanageable flood of data" online, and requiring companies like Google to ensure that every site is legal would "seriously call into question" the very nature of a search site's business model despite its legality. European Union countries h...