Surfshark has explored global government requests to Google, revealing trends, top-requesting countries, and reasons behind content removal
Since 2020, UK’s courts and government agencies have requested Google to remove content 2.2k times, positioning UK in the 14th place globally, according to Surfshark’s study. On a global scale, governmental requests for content removal climbed to nearly 330k, with an annual average growth rate of 3 per cent since 2020. Starting at over 44,000 requests in 2020, this number surpassed 100,000 by 2023, indicating that the volume of requests has more than doubled.
“Government requests to remove content from Google shed light on the legal rules that govern online access to information. These requests often focus on political content or criticism of government actions. To justify such restrictions, governments typically cite laws related to defamation, privacy and security, or copyright. Google reviews each request carefully to determine if the content breaks any laws or violates its policies before deciding how to proceed,” commented Emilija Kucinskaite, Senior Researcher at Surfshark.
‘Privacy and Security’ the main reason for content removal requests
Throughout this decade, the British government made 2.2k requests for content removal from Google, averaging about 40 requests per month. The top 3 justifications used by the UK’s government were Privacy and Security (41.7 per cent), followed by Regulated Goods and Services (19.2 per cent) and Copyright (10.3 per cent).
Compared to Ireland, the UK submitted 850 per cent more requests for content removal from Google throughout this decade. The most targeted Google products and services were Web Search (1.3k), YouTube (500), and Google Images (86).
Compared to 2020, there were 248 per cent more requests for content removal submitted to Google by the British government in 2023. 2024 alone accounts for 32 per cent of all requests made throughout this decade, marking it a record year. It is important to note that our analysis does not include complete data for 2024, which could potentially affect the trend.
Top countries by Google content removal requests
-
Since 2020, nearly 330k requests have been submitted, originating from almost 150 countries, with an annual average growth rate of 34 per cent.
-
In this decade, three countries have accounted for around 80 per cent of the total content removal requests:
-
Russia accounts for 64 per cent of the total, with over 211,000 requests (almost 130 per day).
-
South Korea is second, with 10 per cent of requests, totaling nearly 33,000 requests or approximately 20 per day.
-
India follows with 5 per cent, translating to almost 16,000 requests or around 9 per day.
-
Among the top 15 with the highest number of Google removal requests are also Taiwan, Turkey, Brazil, Bangladesh, France, Pakistan, the United States, Australia, Germany, Vietnam, the UK and Indonesia.
-
Notably, of all countries or regions not in this list (about 90 per cent of all countries) submitted fewer than one request per day on average.
Courts and government agencies may request to remove content from Google products and services — from Blogger and Google Translate to Gmail. However, this decade, the majority of requests have been directed towards YouTube, which accounts for 54 per cent of requests. Web Search is in second place accounting for 31 per cent of requests. Together, these two platforms account for 85 per cent of the received content removal requests.
Global insights: why do governments ask for content removal?
Each request is categorised by reason, with over 20 different grounds for requesting content removal from Google products or services. This decade, the three most common reasons have been National Security, with over 96,000 requests; Copyright, with nearly 71,000 requests; and Privacy and Security, with more than 37,000 requests. Together, these three reasons account for over 60 per cent of content removal requests globally.
