“We have received requests to remove political content” – The País.com (Spain)

David Drummond, Google’s vice president, in Madrid. / carlos rosillo

David Drummond is Google a key man. It is responsible for relations with governments, legal issues, oversees acquisitions and mergers as chairman of Google Ventures. The negotiation process for abuse of dominant position in Brussels, one of the finest pools to which the technology giant is facing, he has led. He has also participated in the round of talks that technological platform has driven across Europe to discuss the thorny issue of right to oblivion.

Man of serious and deep, tall, husky voice, lawyer training, integrating the so-called L-Team, the team of seven managers in which rests the megajefe Larry Page. “Our greatest fear is to become large, successful and slow,” he says in an exclusive interview with the country being held in the headquarters of the firm in Torre Picasso, Madrid. Innovation is a cornerstone of the project, he says, and set ambitious goals is the best way to keep innovating.

question. Google has a presence in the market, according to sources, between 80% and 90% in Europe. There has been much criticism of the negotiations with the European Commission on the issue of abuse of dominant position.

Answer. We’ve been working for four years and have been extremely cooperative. Yes, there are reviews, there are many competitors who would like Google to send them more traffic and more business; but we have never considered that our obligation is to provide business competitors, but give good service to users. The fact that we have not been successful is because we limit the choice of these. Also, in the mobile world, people come to sites through applications and not necessarily with the search engine. Google does absolutely nothing to obstruct competition. Our high market share is not an indicator of unfair competition.

P. Critics say the search criteria are not fair, the same does not apply to all websites visibility criteria.

R. They would be better placed in Google. We understand because many of them have websites and operate successfully. But we are not excluding competition and preventing consumers from accessing those websites

.

With the first revelations Snowden, we decided we had to code all of our network

P. is also criticized that many technology companies are taking their income to Ireland reduce their tax burden. I think Google is the case of Spain …

R. I challenge the argument that we are diverting revenues anywhere. We have our European headquarters in Ireland. The European Union sets the standards so that companies can choose the country to set up their headquarters and that would be the main place where they pay their taxes. We are not alone in this. Is EU policy allowing Ireland have lower taxes. If people think that the system should be changed, we will operate with there. Keep in mind that we generate income and develop technologies that we spend money in the United States, so the issue of taxes is complicated. And business works.

P. There is growing concern in the G-20 and OECD on this issue, they want to stop there loopholes in this field.

R. We understand that some people think that the system needs to be reformed.

P. The fact that the Court of Justice of the European Union has recognized the right to forget them gives you great power to say what is to be found on the Net about anyone to perform a search. Google, which is already a very powerful company, now will be even more.

R. They say this is rare. Google is a search engine. We are not those who publish information; the people we index to access it. We’ve always done according to the parameters that people, democracies have decided. A new parameter, in Europe, now is the right to be forgotten, and we are working to implement it. We did not mean to be resolved so we are following the law, which has been left in the hands of a few private companies, search engines, that decision.

P. This is a great power.

R. Do not know if it is set to argue that power, when it is a legal obligation. We have always controlled what we present in our. It’s a great responsibility to do so in an objective manner that reflects the network, which provides good access to information, with relevant results, and will continue to do so. The irony is that we had a different view of the balance that had to come and litigate for years in another direction. So, to the extent that you say it is a power, it is a power that we were looking for.

P. The web Eliminalia said more than 200 politicians have resorted them to exercise the right to forget and clear his name. Do you have data about this

R I can not comment on the numbers, but there is no doubt that we have received requests from politicians to have withdrawn content?.; I know that we have rejected the vast majority because we believe the public interest in the issue.

P. In December 2013, with the revelations of espionage NSA, Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Apple and Facebook asked in writing to President Obama reforms to establish restrictions in monitoring government agencies. Why they did before the scandal broke?

R. Well, we were not aware that the Government was taking steps he was taking in that bulky surveillance. When it was announced that the United States government was recording and had access to records of every call that is made, we did not. It happened in secret. When we became aware of this, the subsequent revelations about monitoring Internet traffic, and the possibility that the Government had tried to enter parts of our corporate network through our data centers, we thought it was absolutely necessary to change the system and limit some of these practices.

P. But the United States Government access to Google’s servers had

R . do not believe that they had it. There were some links between our data centers that were not coded. As we begin to see what was happening, and with the first revelations of Snowden, decided we had to code all of our network.

P. Apart from that encoding, are you have done something in Google to alleviate the concern that many people have about the security of their communications?

R. We’ve spent millions and millions of dollars to ensure that our networks are secure ; We have coded more services, including email, than any other provider in the industry. And will continue to do all these things.

Drummond Opposes the introduction of so-called Google , canon rate that is under bill in the Senate and by which is expected that news aggregators such as Google News, pay some compensation to the content providers, such as newspapers. “The intellectual property laws already provide a good balance between the rights of the copyright owner and the public,” he says. “We do not have ads on the news, that’s not how Google makes money; we make money when people do business, travel and other searches. “

ensures that the controversy over the collection of personal data wireless networks that captured the cars through the streets of the world with Street View program will not be repeated. “We will update Street View, but not collect the type of data that concerned people. We collected data did not want to pick up. We discovered it and we did know, we fix it, so we will not do anymore; not happen again. ” Mind you it difficult to operate in countries where freedom of speech is threatened, such as Russia and, of course, China, from which decided to move their servers to transfer to Hong Kong, after receiving much criticism for its cooperation with the Chinese regime .

P. For a long time they were criticized because they accepted delete certain information in China. Do you think that was a mistake subject to censorship for a few years?

R. We changed the approach because we feel that … I think I explained it pretty well in 2010, maybe I can look and you will get answer to your question. We thought we would help China’s opening and, perhaps, if we gave access to a vast amount of information, even if there were small amounts that the laws required to limit us, over time, users would demand greater access to information system and loosen. When that did not happen, we thought we could not go there to be consistent with our values.