Activists fear the EU ruling on the Right to be Forgotten could have negative consequences especially in the Arabic region, where repressive regimes could use it as a pretext to expand censorship measures. Despite the EU court specified the Right to be Forgotten can find application only through a case-by-case assessment, the quantity of removal requests approved by Google - de facto resulting in blocking legitimate journalistic works - is so high and impactful that it is reasonable to believe this ruling could expand its consequences beyond European borders. Google’s CEO Larry Page himself has warned of the dangerous doors that this ruling could open to certain foreign governments more keen on strengtheninginternet filtering practices; and his words have already been echoed by Arabic advocates, such as Dhouha Ben Youssef, who remarks how investigative journalism, emerging in this area, will potentially come to a halt. The UAE already passed a federal decree in 2012 that officially aim at fighting cybercrimes, but, on the other hand, it allows a pervasive control and suppression of authentic online content allegedly violating privacy rights. According to Arabic government officials their laws and practices are as democratic as those of Europe, this is why western democratic regulators should be very cautious when they legislate: they have to be aware they are not only impacting their citizens’ future, but they are also inspiring foreign countries. An example of this phenomenon is the establishment of the Tunisian Technical Telecommunication Agency; Former Tunisian ICTs minister Mongi Marzouk has openly commented that the Budapest Convention on Cybercrime was what stimulated his executive to do “better” in restraining internet freedoms. gLAWcal Team LIBEAC project Wednesday, 12 November 2014 (Source: Global Voices)