Google Faces Possible Lawsuit in South Korea Over Exposure of Sex Crime Victims' Data
South Korea's Ministry of Gender Equality and Family is considering filing a criminal complaint against Google over the exposure of personal information contained in removal requests for digital sex crime content from its search results.
The ministry learned about the issue on August 25, when it discovered that some identifying information had been shared with a US-based research database, making it publicly accessible. The database operator removed or blocked around 200 postings, including 15 that contained personally identifying information, after being contacted by the ministry.
Google's policy is not to share victims' information with the database, and the company claims to have asked the database operator to delete the material as soon as it discovered the issue. However, the ministry has demanded a full account of how the information was disclosed and what measures will be taken to prevent similar incidents in the future.
A meeting between Google Korea executives and the Ministry's officials took place on Saturday, with a follow-up meeting held on Monday with Google's Asia-Pacific representatives based in Singapore. The ministry is exploring various measures to protect victims and prevent such incidents from happening again.