1 Introduction

Abstract

In the following chapter, we examine a number of technological developments which are of particular significance for the shifts in the relation between remembering and forgetting that have occurred. We begin with the technology that first gave rise to a court decision at EU level that affirmed the existence of a “right to be forgotten” within EU data protection law: search engines. As the Internet began to move beyond a platform that was primarily of interest only to academics and US military personnel, search engines quickly came to fill a critical role in providing meaningful access to the universe of content within the World Wide Web. To this day, they serve as important tools to help users find goods, services, and information on the Internet and as virtually essential resources to ensure that newly emerging content receives attention and that websites, individuals, companies, and brands establish a foothold on the Internet. Thus, the prominence of information highlighted by search engines is directly related to whether and how long that information is “remembered” by digital society.