Europe: Search engines violate data rules

The New York Times reports that EU officials are concerned about Microsoft, Yahoo and Google.

European Union officials on Wednesday said Google, Microsoft and Yahoo had violated rules by keeping data on individual computer users for too long. The New York Times reports that a group of 27 European national privacy chiefs said it would also ask the United States Federal Trade Commission to investigate whether the data retention practices of the three companies violated American law. In a letter sent Wednesday, the advisory panel to the European Commission asked the three companies to appoint outside auditors to verify that their practices of rendering individual data anonymous truly eliminated all links to individuals. Under European Union data protection rules, search engines are required to sever all traceable links to individual computer users completely and irrevocably after six months.

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