Yahoo Japan has been found guilty of “defaming” a man after its search results contained links to websites containing false information about him. The search results claimed that the man was a gangster and that he had blackmailed people. However, after an investigation by the court, it was found that the allegations had no truth to them and so Yahoo Japan was guilty of defamation for not deleting the search results as requested. It had originally hidden the results but had not deleted them. It has now been ordered to delete the results completely. In rounding up the case, the judge said that search engines were guilty of defamation if they display information that neither serves the public interest nor has any truth to them.
