Businesswoman Mary Wambui wants Google to bury fraud stories

Businesswoman Mary Wambui has sued technology giant Google in a landmark case over the right to be forgotten.

Wambui, in her case, filed before the High Court, admits that she had been charged in 2021 with an alleged Sh2.2 billion criminal case, which was subsequently withdrawn in January 2023.

 The Athi Water Works Development Agency chairperson now wants the court to order that all online stories on what transpired in court be erased.

 The President William Ruto ally claimed that she continues to be questioned and judged based on the withdrawn criminal case.

“Following the withdrawal, there remained no criminal case, investigation, or charge against me in relation to the said allegations. Despite this, whenever my name is searched on the Google Search platform, multiple articles continue to appear among the top results, suggesting or implying that I am still facing criminal prosecution for tax evasion,” claimed Wambui.

The businesswoman argued that the articles, which were published by Kenyan media houses, are outdated and do not reflect her current image.

For this, she went after Google LLC, which is based in California and Google Kenya.

 She alleged that the historical troves have ruined her businesses and prejudiced her, as anyone who needs to know who she is will just search her name.

According to her, keeping the stories online is against her right to keep her private affairs from unwarranted exposure, right to protection of her reputation and dignity.

“As a businesswoman with cross-border interests, the global reach of Google Search has magnified the harm far beyond Kenya, exposing me to prejudice and reputational injury internationally,” she said.

 Her lawyer Emmanuel Mumia argued that Google has continued to index the stories from various media houses, giving them prominence as if they had allegedly happened yesterday.

“The petitioner has no control over the respondents’ indexing systems, and unless urgent orders are granted, the prejudice will persist daily and irreparably. The damage is continuous, compounding with each search, and cannot be adequately remedied through an award of damages at the conclusion of the petition,” argued Mumia.

The lawyer further argued that Sections 25(a), (b) and (c) of the Data Protection Act bar data holders from further processing personal data in a manner that breaches a person’s privacy and dignity.

He asserted that once the DPP dropped the charges, the search engine company ought to have ensured that the articles detailing the charges were no longer circulated.

“The respondents knew, or ought to have known, that the impugned publications had become outdated and misleading; yet they failed, refused, and/or neglected to take any corrective steps to delist, de-index, or otherwise restrain their continued circulation, thereby acting negligently, recklessly, and in studied disregard of my rights,” said Mumia.

Wambui’s lawyer argued that, in other countries, Google has been ordered to remove content in a battle for the right to be forgotten. He cited a case by the European Court of Justice judgment against Google Spain SL and Google Inc, against Agencia Española de Protección de Datos (AEPD) and Mario Costeja González.

 He asserted that Google has allegedly continued to show Wambui as an accused person. According to him, each query of Wambui’s name returns the impugned links, thereby reinforcing the false impression.

He said that Google ought to ensure that the information contained in its search engine is accurate and current.

“Petitioner avers that the essence of her grievance does not lie in the original reporting of the matter, but in the respondents’ relentless maintenance, indexing, and amplification of content that is no longer accurate, current, or reflective of the true legal position, thereby perpetuating a narrative both distorted and injurious to her. Such acts constitute a flagrant breach of the petitioner’s rights under the Constitution, as well as the rights enshrined within the Data Protection Act,” he argued.

Wambui wants the court to find that by keeping the stories online, Google has violated her right to be forgotten.

At the same time, she is seeking an order to force the company to permanently delist, de-index, expunge all links, search results, cached pages, archived versions, mirror sites, derivative publications and any other content that links her to tax evasion charges.

She also wants Google to ensure that she is forgotten by suppressing the algorithm to ensure that the searches done on her do not retrieve any story on the criminal prosecution.

 According to her, this will preserve the accuracy and integrity of information accessible to the public about her.