Google turned me into a serial killer • Hacker News Board

Re: Google turned me into a serial killer

#131

Post by aikah » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 8:29 PM UTC

n_u_l_l wrote: post #111

aikah wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Damages require proof. Unless they can show they lost something because of the mistake, then there are no damages. You're basing your understanding of slander/libel on US laws I presume? If that person lives in Europe, generally, the bar for a successful lawsuit is __extremly low__ , it only requires the information to be blatantly false, there is no need to demonstrate the victim incurred any damages.

The barrier for a successful lawsuit is indeed very low, and based on my limited understanding, I think you will likely win when you demand that Google changes the picture on their website. They will likely also have to cover a part of your legal costs. However if we are talking about monetary damages, those require hard proof of the damages and even then it is unlikely that they will have to pay all damages. Most la…

> However if we are talking about monetary damages, those require hard proof of the damages and even then it is unlikely that they will have to pay all damages. Most lawyers I talk to usually recommend against suing for monetary damages.

Well, you can ask for "moral damages" and the judge might grant you these damages in Europe, I'm pretty sure the bar is also quite low for these. If you are from US keep in mind that million dollars damage verdicts are rather uncommon in Europe for individuals. That's the trade off. So judges might grant the suing party "moral damages" much more easily as a counter part. Of course it varies from country to country. IANAL.

Re: Google turned me into a serial killer

#132

Post by _etyf » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 8:31 PM UTC

Google's Knowledge Graph info boxes are automatically-generated and littered with errors. I've been burned twice on operating hours, once for my local bank and once for a convenience store, driving over each time only to find the place closed. In both cases, the correct hours were posted on the business's website. I've also seen bad KG results for medical conditions, listing the wrong symptoms or describing easily-treatable maladies as "Incurable". Now I actively ignore the info box and intentionally click through to an authoritative non-Google website.

To a non-technical user, I'm sure the box looks like a human-curated result which they're more likely to trust. Maybe that's the goal of Google's UI choices. Couldn't be further from the truth.

Re: Google turned me into a serial killer

#133

Post by bliteben » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 8:32 PM UTC

ghaff wrote: post #77

paulpauper wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would req. showing that law was broken. I don't think in this case it was. More like a mistake.

If Google refused to fix it, it might be different. But I expect that, if someone were to file a suit, not even trying to get it fixed wouldn't be seen as acting in good faith.

Meanwhile sending an email to Google asking for something to be fixed, could be seen as an act of insanity.

Re: Google turned me into a serial killer

#134

Post by anigbrowl » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 8:33 PM UTC

Google is being eaten by its own algorithm at this point, and increasingly reminds me of Lycos (if you don't get it, be glad you're still young).

Re: Google turned me into a serial killer

#135

Post by tpmx » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 8:35 PM UTC

nerbert wrote: post #56

exporectomy wrote: post #50

This kind of mixup isn't too rare. I remember Googling "sigmoid" used to show a mixture of information about the function and the colon as if they were the same thing. There was also a famous case of something like "7 deadly sins" showing a rainbow flag for the sin of pride. It's creepy because it's presented in such a well designed integrated way yet a completely ridiculous mistake that a human wouldn't make.

Yeah, I've been googling people in the last months (job search, interview prep) and google is really bad with homonyms. Occurrences like in this article is the norm when you're not looking for someone famous. Says a lot that Google rolled it out.

Ha.

Just googled my own name. I know there are ~5 living people with the same semi-unusual name. They now show wikipedia text for an 18th century person (with the same name) along with a great 2020ish color photo of one of other currently living people with this name.

I've purposefully kept my few necessary online photos in grayscale, perhaps that helps ever so slightly with their brilliant industry leading AI algorithms...

Re: Google turned me into a serial killer

#136

Post by baron816 » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 8:35 PM UTC

a-and wrote: post #22

What's unfortunate is that Hristo Georgiev is a very common Bulgarian name. This isn't a case where a highly uncommon name can lead to a high degree of certainty in association.

This is why the media usually refers to well known criminals by their full (first middle last) names.

Re: Google turned me into a serial killer

#137

Post by RockmanZero » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 8:36 PM UTC

gundmc wrote: post #26

schoolornot wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He'll be lucky if they don't suspend his Google account outright for raising the issue.

This just seems like a bad faith comment. Is there ANY example of a user raising a legitimate concern like this and getting banned for it? This reads like cheap, low-effort bashing.

this just seems like a google-faith comment.

Re: Google turned me into a serial killer

#138

Post by judge2020 » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 8:38 PM UTC

_etyf wrote: post #132

Google's Knowledge Graph info boxes are automatically-generated and littered with errors. I've been burned twice on operating hours, once for my local bank and once for a convenience store, driving over each time only to find the place closed. In both cases, the correct hours were posted on the business's website. I've also seen bad KG results for medical conditions, listing the wrong symptoms or describing easily-tr…

> . In both cases, the correct hours were posted on the business's website

Google has started favoring info inputted into the Google My Business listing (the same one that dictates what appears in Google Maps for claimed businesses), so if the owners are updating their website but not updating that (or checking their email for emails from google that say '[business], are you open on 4th of July?') it'll show incorrect info.

Re: Google turned me into a serial killer

#139

Post by haswell » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 8:40 PM UTC

minsc__and__boo wrote: post #75

haswell wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That Google controls/censors information is well established [0]. The side effects of their search algorithms and how they control the flow of information has also been a topic of regular discussion/scrutiny for many years (just one example here [1]) > and if they really tried people would leave Where would they go? - [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_by_Google - [1] https://mindmatters.ai/2019/07/google-e…

I know you're trying to make a point about censorship existing, but I'm not sure if loli porn and scam online pharmacies were really contributing to the internet.

I agree with you; however, that's kind of the point. Google has the power to organize and control a significant amount of information. These statements are very different:

- Google doesn't censor anything

- Google censors things that a lot of people agree are offensive

The 2nd gets into tricky territory, because not everyone agrees on what is/is not offensive. I happen to think that most of the things they remove are probably good to remove. But the implication is still that Google wields (and at times uses) enormous power.

Things get even more grey (and potentially problematic) when you get into ranking algorithms, which have the power to sway opinions on major topics/events.

And as you mentioned, my parent comment is also a response to the very direct (and incorrect) claim:

> It seems that they do [control information], but they don't.

Re: Google turned me into a serial killer

#140

Post by Someone » Thu, Jun 24, 2021, 8:40 PM UTC

jetrink wrote: post #42

The info boxes sometimes contain surprising errors. I recently searched for Picasa and was informed that it was invented by Pablo Picasso in 2002! Google 'knows' Picasso died in the 1970s and it 'knows' he released a popular software program in 2002. That's an obvious contradiction requiring the simplest of rules to detect, but the system is just a dumb text extractor. (Interestingly, Google assistant gave the correc…

In this case, we also several hints that the guy is dead:

- “Hristo Bogdanov Georgiev […] was a Bulgarian rapist and serial killer”

- “Cause of Death: Execution by hanging”

- “Died: August 28, 1980 (aged 23-24)”

Yet we also have

- Born: 1956 (age 65 years)

Also, if they don’t exactly know at what age he died, how do they know he would be 65 now, and not 64?

I think Google can do better, but not at the scale they need to cover all bases in Google search.