British politicians and EU officials expressed concern on Thursday after it emerged that a seven-year-old article criticising a former Merrill Lynch chief executive was set to be removed from Google's search results. The action, which comes as the internet search company responds to the EU ruling on the "right to be forgotten" by removing articles from its European search rankings, led to accusations of censorship and over-reach. Titled "Merrill's mess", the 2007 blog post by Robert Peston, now the BBC's economics editor, describes how Stan O'Neal left the US investment bank after it suffered huge losses on risky investments. In a blog post on Wednesday Mr Peston said the search company had in effect removed his article from the public record, "given that Google is the route to information and stories for most people".
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Google responded to the EU ruling on the "right to be forgotten" by removing articles from search rankings
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The internet search company's action led to accusations of censorship and over-reach
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The EU's highest court ruled that individuals can request the removal of some search results
Mr @placeholder was the only individual named in the 2007 article, but Mr Peston pointed out in an update to his Wednesday night blog post that the request could have come from any of the readers who commented beneath the original article, or anyone named in those comments.