
Google: Please Stop Telling Lies About Me - Pattio
https://ehudreiter.com/2019/01/21/google-lies-about-me/
======
jnbiche
Seeing as how the author was indeed born in Israel, I figured at first that it
was unreasonable to complain, since like or or not he was probably an Israeli
citizen.

However, looking into Israeli citizenship law, I learned that Israel does
_not_ have birthright citizenship. So he was not automatically a citizen
despite being born there. Had his parents been Israelis (and that doesn't
appear to be the case), he would be Israeli.

It's true that he's likely _eligible_ to claim Israeli citizenship through the
law of return. But being eligible for Israeli citizenship isn't the same as
having it.

So I do understand the annoyance. It's not just a technicality--he actually
doesn't have Israeli citizenship. Google's algorithm appears to assume all
countries practice birthright citizenship like the US (when many, probably
most, do not).

~~~
p1necone
Is there a set of circumstances that could result in someone being born in
Israel without gaining citizenship, while also not getting citizenship in the
country their parents were from?

~~~
jnbiche
I think that in the vast, vast majority of countries (all of them?), you
receive the citizenship of your parents, regardless of the country in which
you're born.

So unless
ther[https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jnbichee's](https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jnbichee's)
a country where this is not the case, the situation you're describing would
not occur. And if there is such a country, the problem would not be unique to
Israel, since birthright citizenship is not practiced in many (most?)
countries.

Edit: Interesting. As user cwzwarich points out, it appears that India is
indeed such a country. So looks like it's possible to be stateless at birth if
you're Indian and born in one of the many countries without birthright
citizenship. That said, all an Indian citizen has to do if that happens is to
report the birth at an Indian embassy within 1 year of the birth, and then the
child is an Indian citizen. But if your parents are irresponsible or unaware
of the law...

~~~
rahimnathwani
"I think that in the vast, vast majority of countries (all of them?), you
receive the citizenship of your parents, regardless of the country in which
you're born."

For the UK at least, it's not that simple, unless your parents were born in
the UK. If your parents citizenship is due solely to one/both of your
grandparents being UK citizens (i.e. your parents were also born overseas),
you might not be entitled to UK citizenship.

I don't recall the details, but IIRC you need to live in the UK for some time
in order to pass on citizenship to your child.

The US has similar rules.

~~~
jnbiche
> The US has similar rules.

US doesn't have citizenship by descent (the grandparents situation you're
describing). So it has no similar rules.

~~~
joshuamorton
Yes it does. It can get complex, but in the simplest case, if your parents are
married and both citizens, you will be to, no matter where you were born.

~~~
jnbiche
I'm well aware of this, since I have close family that your situation applies
to. Actually, if your parents are married and even _one_ is a US citizen, you
will be too, always.

This may just be a terminology disagreement, but that's typically not what is
considered "citizenship by descent".

What we're describing is considered by the US to be "citizenship by parents"
or "acquired citizenship". On the other hand, "citizenship by descent" is the
European tradition of awarding citizenship to grandchildren and even great-
grandchildren of citizens. The US doesn't have citizenship by descent (in
fact, it's true that there's a single situation when your grandparent's
citizenship can matter to someone trying to assert US citizenship, but it's
only as a kind of "tiebreaker" if your parents _weren 't_ married and one was
a US citizen).

~~~
dragonwriter
> > in the simplest case, if your parents are married and both citizens, you
> will be to, no matter where you were born.

> I'm well aware of this, since I have close family that your situation
> applies to. Actually, if your parents are married and even one is a US
> citizen, you will be too, always.

You are both wrong.

If both parents are US citizens _and_ at least one of them has ever been a
resident of the US or one of itd outlying possessions, you acquire citizenship
at birth.

If your parents are married, one is a US citizen, and the other a non-citizen
national, the US citizen parent must have been resident in the US for at least
one year for you to automatically acquire citizenship at birth.

If the non-citizen parent isn't a national, the citizen parent must be
resident in the US for five years, at least two of which were after the age of
14.

[https://www.uscis.gov/policymanual/HTML/PolicyManual-
Volume1...](https://www.uscis.gov/policymanual/HTML/PolicyManual-
Volume12-PartH-Chapter3.html)

------
jccalhoun
I hate it when people call being wrong "lying." This is a semantic argument.
He was born there so it could be argued that Israeli is technically accurate.
I hate it when people call being wrong "lying."

~~~
alistairSH
Being wrong once without intent to be wrong is not lying.

In this case, Google continues to repeat wrong information long after being
corrected multiple times. At this point, it's fair to say they are lying.

~~~
anonytrary
It's not lying. Maybe it's being wrong, maybe it's negligence, but it's not
lying. It's not like they're trying to display the wrong information. The
algorithm isn't a person. It's not as simple as saying "oh, our algorithm
messed up, we'll kindly tell it to say that you live over there from now on".

I wouldn't call it lying, I'd call it a sub-optimal algorithm design.

~~~
zrth
Generally, the person or group of people behind an algorithm needs to be fully
accountable and responsible for the algorithm they use to interact with the
world.

If saying: "it's not me, it's the algorithm" gets you out of the
responsibility you can do all kinds of morally questionable things.

(edit: grammeer)

~~~
myownlittlworld
"It's not me, it's the killbot algorithm I designed, patented, and licensed!"

In seriousness, though, I agree and we're already way behind the eight-ball on
this one, given predictive policing and bail algorithms.

------
robbrown451
I think it is far less an issue of faulty AI and more an issue of Google
ignoring requests to change information about someone when that person
notifies them that it is incorrect.

It's one thing to show things in search results, a very different thing to
have a little box saying "We Google have deduced that this is true." They
should take more responsibility.

In my opinion they should be required to do something about it. It is very
similar to how you can tell google your privacy is invaded by something on
Google Maps and they will fix it (with blurring, in that case).

~~~
mqus
Actually, there already is a (EU) law for it, it is called GDPR[1] and within
it, you have a right to let businesses correct personal information about you.

[1][https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CEL...](https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:02016R0679-20160504&from=EN) See Article 5,
Paragraph 1d and 2 and Article 16

~~~
caf
...and as a UK citizen, the author should have no problem making such a
request.

------
FVIIIvWF
I thought the colon should be a comma instead. It misled me to thinking Google
was unhappy about people telling lies about them.

~~~
jnbiche
Actually, the author's use of the colon is correct, and your interpretation
doesn't accord with the usual rules of grammar for colon usage.

What I assume you're thinking of is the journalistic use of a colon as
shorthand for attribution, normally used in headlines. In that case, the colon
and person/organization fall at the _end_ of the sentence. So you'll see
things like, "We'll never pass upcoming bill: Rep Smith".

But that's not what the author of the blog post wrote. Instead, he placed
"Google" at the beginning of the sentence, writing "Google: Please Stop...".
As such, he used the colon in accordance with one of its most common usages--
as a means of address in correspondence, similar to common letter opening
"Dear Mr. Smith: Please find enclosed...".

~~~
jolmg
Actually, putting the attribution at the beginning is how transcripts are
usually done. You can see it in articles that are mainly the transcript of an
interview[1], or even in court transcripts[2].

> similar to common letter opening "Dear Mr. Smith: Please find enclosed...".

It's been some time since I've written a letter, but I remember that the
typical format uses a comma and not a colon. For example:

    
    
        Dear Mr. Smith,
    
        Please find enclosed...
    

This[3] could be an example.

[1] - [https://techcrunch.com/2006/09/02/an-interview-with-vc-
paul-...](https://techcrunch.com/2006/09/02/an-interview-with-vc-paul-graham-
of-ycombinator/)

[2] -
[https://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcr...](https://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcripts/2018/17-532_32q3.pdf)

[3] - [https://www.fotolip.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/How-to-
Wr...](https://www.fotolip.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/How-to-Write-a-
Resignation-Letter-15.png)

~~~
jnbiche
Yes, but this is clearly a headline, not a transcript.

And using a colon in a salutation is recommended for business usage according
to most style manuals. Traditionally, style manuals discourage letter writers
from using a comma unless they are friendly with the recipient.

------
pliny
Wikipedia (de) lists Ehud as an Israeli(-American) computer scientist and this
may be the source of the problem.

~~~
doublekill
I've read discussions between Wikipedia editors and people the article was
about, and they were told to not edit the article, or produce a "no original
research" authoritative source. On facts about their own life. So either a
kind soul should edit it for them, or TechCrunch should pick up on this story.

And then hope they don't call you something outrageous like: the grandfather
of X. Or: some people call her a Y. Because that will be in the article lead
as a cold-hard machine readable logical fact for the ages.

~~~
JorgeGT
Or do like Philip Roth and have the New Yorker publish your Wikipedia
rebuttals: [https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/an-open-
letter-t...](https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/an-open-letter-to-
wikipedia)

~~~
jnbiche
An option sadly unavailable to most of us.

------
Lazare
Coincidentally, I just ran across someone else trying (and failing) to get
Google to update a similar incorrect line in their knowledge graph. In this
case, the person is fairly well known on YouTube, and their profession line
should almost certainly read "Canadian YouTuber" (as the profession line for
all of her peers does), but instead it reads "Actress", which is pretty odd
and inaccurate. (You could make an argument that someone who posts content on
YouTube is _technically_ an actor/actress, but that's a very uncommon usage,
and as with OP, misleads much more that it conveys useful information. And
again, Google, who owns YouTube, clearly prefers to label prominent YouTubers
as <nationality> YouTuber.)

In her case she apparently got a response saying "our systems don't allow us
to fix this type of error", she escalated, then she got a response saying
"good news, it's fixed!", but it's not fixed.

If Google is just summarising info from other sources (and in many cases, they
just repeat what Wikipedia has), that's fine, but in cases (as here) where
they're acting as an independent source of truth, they really need some
process for fixing mistakes...

------
VikingCoder
If you want Google to be authoritative, you're going to have a bad time. It's
literally not designed to be a source of truth. It's designed to tell you what
it finds on the Internet.

~~~
saagarjha
> It's literally not designed to be a source of truth.

Google seems to be pushing very hard lately to be considered the source of
truth, picking information out of context and putting it in their infobox with
no explanation as to where they grabbed it from.

------
WhitneyLand
For anyone else curious.

I'm not sure, but a cursory search suggests it's perfectly fine to publicly
lie about a private citizen with no recourse, as long as you avoid financial
or related damages?

"In order to determine the damages from a slander or libel suit, there must be
quantifiable damages. Defamation of character damages a person’s or company’s
reputation, and it must be proven that the damage to reputation correlated
with a loss of money, property, relationship or was subject to harassment that
led to any of the above losses."

[https://thelawdictionary.org/article/when-to-sue-for-
defamat...](https://thelawdictionary.org/article/when-to-sue-for-defamation-
slander-and-libel)

~~~
greenyoda
It may be "perfectly fine" in terms of legal repercussions, but there are also
ethical considerations. If someone knowingly makes false statements about
someone else, they would rightfully be regarded as unethical and
untrustworthy.

~~~
WhitneyLand
You're very sweet. How about telling them something like...

Pardon me, Mr. Google and Mr. <consider who you're dealing with in these
scenarios>, how are you sir? Would you kindly consider not publishing false
statements about me?

Of course you may not be compelled to do so. However as a gentleman I'm sure
you would ageee the ethical and trust implications are philosophically
untenable. Therefore I assume you are intrinsically highly motivated to
immediately take corrective action. Thank you!

Regarding the first sentence, please take it at face value. If that's your
point of view I'd be glad to count you as a friend if you'd have me - ping
anytime.

However, I'd probably not guess well how long Ehud will have to remain an
Israeli computer scientist.

~~~
robbrown451
Or, how about blogging about it, and having internet discussions about it that
cause Google to realize that this is negatively impacting their image to the
public, and that that in itself can be costly enough to them to change their
approach, even if not compelled to do so by a court?

Which is exactly what happened here. (whether they change their course is yet
to be seen)

------
puzzle
Interestingly, Google gets it right about Terry Gilliam. He was famous also
for being the only non-British Monty Python, but he became a citizen and gave
up his American passport.

He's listed as "British screenwriter". I guess you could argue that he's that,
sure, but a director first, so it doesn't get this one exactly right, either,
but for different reasons. Anyway, although British is technically right, I'm
probably not the only one that will forever consider him American.

BTW, the Wikipedia snippet underneath says "Terrence Vance Gilliam is an
American-born British screenwriter, film director, animator, actor, comedian
and former member of the Monty Python comedy troupe." Makes you wonder...

------
O1111OOO
Sent (very unkind) feedback to Google via the infobox that appears for Ehud
Reiter[0]. It's about time Google developes a mechanism for handling cases
like these and so many others (like all the cases where people lose access to
their accounts completely).

We shouldn't need legislation or lawsuits.

[0]
[https://www.google.com/search?q=Ehud%20Reiter](https://www.google.com/search?q=Ehud%20Reiter)

------
sohkamyung
For reference, author Greg Egan also had troubles with getting Google to stop
putting up incorrect information on him, including photos of other people
named Greg Egan on his profile [1]

[1]
[http://www.gregegan.net/ESSAYS/GOOGLE/Google.html](http://www.gregegan.net/ESSAYS/GOOGLE/Google.html)

------
paul7986
Easy solution don’t use Google use DuckDuckGo.com or another search engine.

~~~
zapzupnz
This comment doesn't correspond with the content of the blog post. It relates
to Google's algorithms; one's personal choice of search engine does not change
the fact that the results Google shows are ultimately seen by more eyes than
anything else.

~~~
jakeogh
Sure it does. General awareness of google's increasing tendency to engineer
language will result in people not trusting it... possibly to the point where
this person wouldnt bother to write about it.

~~~
zapzupnz
I still can't see the link to individuals using DDG as an immediate or
relevant solution to the problem discussed by the author. The comment, to my
eyes, came off as flippant.

------
sonnyblarney
This will become an ever more important issue and I feel the only way forward
is via legislation.

Google might care, but not enough to fundamentally do something about it.

FB and G are profitable because they have 'very low touch'. They don't have
legions of tellers, fact checkers, CSR reps and people to handle the myriad of
details other business have to deal with.

These issues are not only 'high touch' \- they are _hard_.

G is not going to start hiring thousands of people to do such things, it's
just not in their DNA.

Maybe some issue will be the straw on the camels back.

------
JustSomeNobody
Google doesn’t care. They offer their products, generally, for free. They
don’t owe you any customer service at all.

Edit:

> > If a journalists says something incorrect about me, I can complain to him
> or his newspaper/magazine, and this will be taken seriously; indeed most
> journalists give me an opportunity to fact-check anything they say about me
> before it is published. If Experian says something wrong about me in its
> credit report, I can report this and they will take this seriously. In fact
> almost all organisations which give out information about me allow me to
> complain and point out problems. Except Google, who clearly doesnt care.

That's what I was commenting on.

~~~
zapzupnz
This comment does not correspond with the content of the article. The blog
writer is discussing the way that Google's algorithms are faulty, presenting
false information quite high in search results. This has little to nothing to
do with customer service; this is about the ethics and responsibility of
algorithms that present information to vast numbers of people.

~~~
JustSomeNobody
> If a journalists says something incorrect about me, I can complain to him or
> his newspaper/magazine, and this will be taken seriously; indeed most
> journalists give me an opportunity to fact-check anything they say about me
> before it is published. If Experian says something wrong about me in its
> credit report, I can report this and they will take this seriously. In fact
> almost all organisations which give out information about me allow me to
> complain and point out problems. Except Google, who clearly doesnt care.

That's what I was commenting on. This quote came from the article.

~~~
zapzupnz
I see, I apologise. Although, I still don't see that the original comment made
responds to the main point that the writer makes, that Google has a
responsibility because their data, correct or not, is presented to such a huge
number of people. Whether the product is free or not has no bearing on their
responsibility to society given their size and influence.

