RTBF: The Urgent Need for Expiration Date of Personal Information in the Cyberspace

Abstract

The internet is an information highway that remembers all our deeds and transgressions. It keeps track of all information posted online and recalls this information when there is a search for results. So, it was easier to find a person’s past deeds and misdeeds online. The need to recollect accessible information drew the court’s attention to the concept of the right to be forgotten. Now, Google Transparency reports that there are currently 4,572,951,633 URLs requests for delisting globally. This is a huge figure for the search engine to handle. Also, the court bestowed the powers to decide what information to delist are in the hands of the tech companies. By so doing, the determination of the right of a person over their personal information is in the hands of the private companies. This paper elucidates the concept of the right to be forgotten and the urgent need for personal information to have an expiration date in the database of the data controller and processor. Also, this paper using Lessig’s pathetic dot theory shall analyze the applicability of an expiration date to personal information globally as with the services offered by most data controllers and data processors.