EN Official Journal of the European Union C 347/22

Request for a preliminary ruling from the Conseil d’État (France) lodged on 21 August 2017 — Google Inc. v Commission nationale de l’informatique et des libertés (CNIL)

(Case C-507/17)

(2017/C 347/30)

Language of the case: French

Referring court

Conseil d’État

Parties to the main proceedings

Applicant: Google Inc.

Defendant: Commission nationale de l’informatique et des libertés (CNIL)

Other parties: Wikimedia Foundation Inc., Fondation pour la liberté de la presse, Microsoft Corp., Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and Others, Article 19 and Others, Internet Freedom Foundation and Others, Défenseur des droits

Questions referred

1. Must the ‘right to de-referencing’, as established by the Court of Justice of the European Union in its judgment of 13 May 2014 (1) on the basis of the provisions of Articles 12(b) and 14(a) of Directive [95/46/EC] of 24 October 1995, (2) be interpreted as meaning that a search engine operator is required, when granting a request for de-referencing, to deploy the de-referencing to all of the domain names used by its search engine so that the links at issue no longer appear, irrespective of the place from where the search initiated on the basis of the requester’s name is conducted, and even if it is conducted from a place outside the territorial scope of Directive [95/46/EC] of 24 October 1995?

2. In the event that Question 1 is answered in the negative, must the ‘right to de-referencing’, as established by the Court of Justice of the European Union in the judgment cited above, be interpreted as meaning that a search engine operator is required, when granting a request for de-referencing, only to remove the links at issue from the results displayed following a search conducted on the basis of the requester’s name on the domain name corresponding to the State in which the request is deemed to have been made or, more generally, on the domain names distinguished by the national extensions used by that search engine for all of the Member States of the European Union?

3. Moreover, in addition to the obligation mentioned in Question 2, must the ‘right to de-referencing’, as established by the Court of Justice of the European Union in its judgment cited above, be interpreted as meaning that a search engine operator is required, when granting a request for de-referencing, to remove the results at issue, by using the ‘geo-blocking’ technique, from searches conducted on the basis of the requester’s name from an IP address deemed to be located in the State of residence of the person benefiting from the ‘right to de-referencing’, or even, more generally, from an IP address deemed to be located in one of the Member States subject to Directive [95/46/EC] of 24 October 1995, regardless of the domain name used by the internet user conducting the search?

(1) Judgment of 13 May 2014, Google Spain and Google, C-131/12, EU:C:2014:317.

(2) Directive 95/46/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 24 October 1995 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data (OJ 1995 L 281, p. 31).