Category: Google|Aug 31, 2023 | Author: Admin

Google snoops on your links and may delete them

• google
• dmca
• piracy
• permalink

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For almost every year, Google has removed pirate links from searches when they have received requests from rights holders to do so under the DMCA legislation.

Google can delete saved pages

But what is new is that the company removes privately stored links to pirated content or other content that Google has already blocked in the search engine.

 

This is exactly what happened to Eddie Roosenmaallen who saved a link to "Kickass Torrents" with Google's "save-bookmark" service.

 

The URL was saved with Google's search app. It is quite startling because this is something the user does privately and which one thought Google had no insight into, or at least did not perform automatic searches for, but that is the case. There are options for sharing saved links, so that's probably where the technical opening lies.

 

This is the message Roosenmaallen received from Google's "Saved on Google" automated service:

 

 

Not all URL types are detected

The reason why Google did not approve that the user saved the URL is that it is supposedly blocked by Google Search. By clicking the save icon in e.g. Chrome stores these URLs and they can be searched by Google. TorrentFreak has managed to reproduce the error:

 

“Google does not allow us to 'store' URLs that have been removed from Google searches, such as YouTube ripper 'Yout.com', torrent site '1337x.to', or 'Katcr.com.'

 

These blocks apply to individual addresses, not entire domains. For example, thepiratebay.org is still visible in Google searches and can be added to a collection. However, Pirate Bay links that have been de-indexed cannot be saved.”

 

TorrentFreak has not heard back from Google and it is therefore “not clear why Google enforces the cached links search policy or if its primary goal is to prevent copyright infringement.”

 

Currently, the impact is relatively limited as the stored function is not widely used. But if Google decides to "moderate" users' Chrome bookmarks, or the DNS resolver, things could get interesting.

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