Can Old News Reports on Google Be Removed? The Court of Cassation’s Approach to the Right to Be Forgotten — Atty. Gizem Gonce
This article provides general information. Legislation, time limits and amounts may change over time; obtain an up-to-date assessment of your specific situation.
What Does the Turkish Court of Cassation’s Approach to the “Right to Be Forgotten” Mean for Personality Rights in the Digital World?
Now that the internet sits at the centre of daily life, a news report published years ago can still appear within seconds when someone searches a person’s first and last name. This raises important legal questions in terms of personality rights.
The question “Why does this news report still come up?” is becoming increasingly important, particularly for people who were the subject of reports about an investigation or a trial but were later acquitted, or whose story has since lost its relevance.
So is it possible to have a news report removed from Google search results? We discussed this question with Attorney Gizem Gonce.
Can a news report that appears when a person’s first and last name are searched on Google be removed?
“Removing a news report from Google is not the same as deleting it entirely from the website.”
Yes, if certain conditions are met, removal from search results may be legally possible. However, a very important distinction must be made here.
Removing content entirely from the source website and that content no longer appearing in searches for a person’s first and last name on a search engine such as Google are not the same legal procedure.
Under the “right to be forgotten”, depending on the circumstances of the specific case, a person may request that search engine results be delisted; under certain conditions, legal avenues may also arise for the content to be taken down or for access to it to be blocked.
However, there is no rule that any news report is automatically “removed because it is old”.
What approach do we see in the Court of Cassation’s recent decisions on this issue?
In its decision of 23 October 2025, docket no. 2023/5140 and decision no. 2025/14576, the 4th Civil Chamber of the Court of Cassation assessed, in terms of the “right to be forgotten”, the fact that old online news reports about a criminal trial that had ended in acquittal were still accessible years later.
In the case at hand, the criminal proceedings conducted against the plaintiff on allegations of drug trafficking had ended in acquittal, and the acquittal had become final. Nevertheless, the news report published years earlier had remained accessible on the website.
The Court of Cassation accepted that a person’s right to be forgotten may be violated where the news reports have lost their relevance and there is no overriding public interest justifying keeping them online. It also ruled that an assessment should be made regarding non-pecuniary damages for the attack on personality rights.
This decision is important because it shows that it cannot be accepted that every piece of information published in the past remains accessible online without limit and indefinitely.
Does the right to be forgotten mean that one’s past on the internet is completely erased?
“The right to be forgotten does not mean that the past is wiped out entirely.”
It is not correct to regard the right to be forgotten as erasing the past.
The aim here is to prevent an event from a person’s past from being put back into circulation online indefinitely and continuously affecting that person’s life even though it has lost its relevance and its public interest.
The case law of the Court of Cassation also shows that criteria such as, in particular;
- the content of the news report,
- the time that has passed,
- whether the news report has lost its relevance,
- whether it has historical value,
- its contribution to the public interest,
- whether the person is a public figure,
- the nature of the news report,
- the balance between freedom of expression and of the press and the person’s personality rights
must be assessed on a case-by-case basis.
Accordingly, not every old news report is to be removed.
What can be done if the person who was the subject of a news report was later acquitted?
This may be highly significant in the legal assessment.
In particular, if the news report created the impression that the person had committed a crime, but an acquittal concerning that person later became final, the fact that the old report remains accessible in the same way years later may have serious consequences for the person’s current life.
In the Court of Cassation’s 2025 decision, the facts that the acquittal had become final, that the news reports were old and had lost their relevance, and that there was no overriding public interest in keeping them online were also among the important elements of the assessment.
However, here too each case must be assessed on its own particular facts. If the news report has historical significance, if the public interest continues, or if the person is a public figure, the balance may be struck differently.
Should the person apply to Google first?
Applying to the search engine itself is an important legal step.
In its decision of 23 June 2020, no. 2020/481, the Turkish Personal Data Protection Board (KVKK Board) accepted that search engines may, under certain conditions, be regarded as data controllers, and that individuals may request that results appearing in searches for their own first and last names be removed from the index.
The Board also stated that, in making the assessment, various criteria should be taken into account, such as the person’s role in public life, the accuracy and relevance of the information, its connection with the person’s working life, whether it contains special categories of personal data, its effect on the person’s reputation, the public interest, and whether it falls within the scope of journalistic activity.
Therefore, it is not sufficient to make an application merely on the grounds that “I don’t like this news report”. The legal grounds must be set out concretely.
If the search engine rejects the request, does the process end there?
No.
If the application to the search engine is rejected or goes unanswered, depending on the nature of the specific case, the options of applying to the Personal Data Protection Board under the KVKK and of going directly to court may arise.
The KVKK Board’s decision no. 2020/481 also states that if the application to the search engine is rejected or goes unanswered, the person concerned may file a complaint with the Board and may also go directly to court.
In addition, depending on the nature of the case, different legal avenues may need to be considered within the framework of the Turkish Civil Code, the Turkish Code of Obligations and Law No. 5651 concerning the protection of personality rights, and of the legislation on the protection of personal data.
If the news report was accurate when it was published, is it no longer possible to have it removed in any way?
No. A news report may have been accurate on the date it was published; however, the legal assessment is not based solely on its accuracy at the moment of first publication.
If, over time, the news report loses its relevance, the person’s situation changes and the report no longer makes a meaningful contribution to the public interest, a different legal assessment may be made.
A 2017 decision of the 19th Criminal Chamber of the Court of Cassation also drew attention to these points, emphasising that criteria such as the loss of relevance of the news report, the length of time it has remained online, the public interest and historical value must be taken into account when online news reports are assessed under the right to be forgotten.
In that case, doesn’t freedom of the press suffer?
“A balance must be struck between freedom of the press and personality rights.”
On the contrary, the issue is not to abolish freedom of the press but to strike a fair balance between two fundamental rights.
Online news archives are extremely valuable as society’s memory. For this reason, systematically deleting all news reports published in the past simply because time has passed is out of the question.
Indeed, the KVKK Board also emphasises that online newspaper archives are important for freedom of expression and of the press.
Therefore, on one side there is society’s right to information and freedom of the press, and on the other the protection of the person’s private life, personality rights and personal data.
The task of the law is to strike a proportionate balance between these two areas according to the circumstances of the specific case.
What is the most important point that people should know?
“Removal of a Google result does not mean the news report has been completely deleted.”
The most important point is that removal from Google search results and complete deletion of a news report from the internet are different from each other.
A news report may no longer appear in searches for the person’s name on a search engine; however, it may still remain published on the website where it is located.
For this reason, the goal must be correctly identified before any legal application is made:
- Is the aim to have the news report removed entirely?
- To block access to a specific URL?
- To stop the result from being shown in searches for the person’s name?
- To correct inaccurate or outdated information?
Each of these situations may involve a different legal method and different conditions.
The “right to be forgotten” provides an important area of legal protection, particularly for content that is old, no longer connected with the person’s current life, has changed its meaning after an acquittal or another legal development, and has a lasting negative effect on the person’s reputation.
However, exercising this right does not mean arbitrarily erasing internet history; it means striking a lawful balance between personality rights, the protection of personal data, freedom of expression, freedom of the press and the public interest.
For this reason, it is very important that a person who comes across an old news report in Google search results obtains an expert legal assessment, rather than concluding outright that “the report will be removed” or “it definitely cannot be removed” without the specific facts of the case being examined.