Here's how to remove information on a site that you own from Google Search results. By "own" we mean that you can modify the contents of any part of the website.
If you do not own the website that hosts the information:
- If the information is still on the webpage, see here.
- If the information is gone from the webpage, but is still appearing on Google, use the Request a refresh of outdated content page.
If you operate the website hosting the content, you can take additional steps to remove it from your own site, as well as from Google’s search results.
- Determine which pages host the information
- Which folders or subdomains of the website (URL patterns) are involved?
- Is it simply one URL? If multiple URLs, do you have a list of all the URL patterns involved?
- Be sure that you are using the correct URL for the page.
- Remove the information from Google
- If you have verified your ownership of the site using Search Console, you can use the Removals tool to immediately remove the page from Google Search. However, be sure that you also block or remove the information from the page itself; the tool removes pages from Google Search only temporarily. Removed pages may return to our search results if no changes are made on the website. Read the tool documentation carefully to learn how to remove single pages, directories, or entire sites. If you have removed the information from your site, you can clear the cache only; otherwise, remove the affected pages as well as the cache.
- Remove the information from your site
- Ensure that you have people with the appropriate rights on your website to make the required changes.
- Remove or block the information using the appropriate method:
- Remove the information from your page [Safest]
- Require a login
- Use the "noindex" tag to block pages from Google, or robots.txt to block images from Google.
- Read more about blocking URLs.
- Prevent the information from being shown again
- Perform regular spot checks for information using the
site:search operator for your site. For example:site:example.com <private ID number here> - Ensure that anyone working on users' personal data is made aware of how to prevent search engine discovery of that data on the site, and how to prevent anonymous access to user data.
- Perform regular spot checks for information using the
