Erasing Digital Footprints: Examining the Right to be Forgotten in the Digital Era

The digital age thrives on data. Data that individuals willingly put out there and data that is needed and demanded for, by many informational sites. The lifespan of data until few years ago was deemed to be permanent but given the rise of data misuse, there have been efforts to cut short such lifespan of data by deliberately acknowledging the existence of certain inherent rights that individuals hold with regard to their personal data. This paper is an attempt to understand the contours of Right to be Forgotten and how the right gained prominence through the legislative and judicial lens of jurisdictions. It also touches upon of the contentious spot which deals with the conflict between the freedom of speech and the right to be forgotten. The paper briefly examines the legal framework, judicial analysis and expert papers that have been instrumental in shaping the right to be forgotten jurisprudence. The methodology used for the purposes of this paper is purely doctrinal.