The Gagarinsky District Court of Moscow satisfied the lawsuit of businessman Oleg Boyko to Google LLC. He demanded to stop the search engine from indexing links to the site with information defaming his honour and dignity.
The international investor founded Finstar Financial Group in 1996. Today, the Group has assets in more than 30 countries in the field of financial technology, digital services and online lending. The value of the Group’s assets is about $2 billion. Over the years, the Group acquired Evrazholding, Baltic Trust Bank and others.
Mr Boyko’s lawyer stated that in 2019, his client declared to the court information posted about him on an anonymous website as false. In particular, he said, the site indicated that the businessman was allegedly responsible for the financial crisis in Asian markets in 1997. In total, 11 points were recognised by the court as defamatory.
Said his lawyer: “We assume that this information appeared on the site at the behest of people who previously worked in the structures created by Mr Boyko but were fired from there for one reason or another. The court satisfied our appeal and recognised this information as untrue.”
On October 8, 2019, Vidzeme District Court in Latvia ruled that the same statements published on certain online resources were accepted as unreliable. It followed that on December 26, 2019, the Gagarinsky District Court of Moscow itself ruled to recognise the allegations about businessman Oleg Boyko and issued in the media as unreliable. On June 7, 2021, Roskomnadzor recognised the activities of the media disseminating the above information as illegal, and it violated the rights of citizens to privacy, personal and family secrets. These media were subsequently blocked by the authority of the Russian Federation.
After that, Mr Boyko turned his focus to Google, requesting that they should not provide a link to this controversial website when showing search results for the query ‘Oleg Boyko.’ However, amicable negotiations with the company were unsuccessful, at which point the businessman decided to take Google to court.
In an interview with Forbes, Mr Boyko explained his actions: “It was to counteract such abuses, and not at all against Google LLC, when this claim was directed and which the court satisfied. We did not ask for any responsibility from Google.”
In his opinion, the outcome in this case may set a precedent.