The European Union is recommending to leading search engines that they follow its data protection rules. The thing to note here is that most of the companies are based outside the European Union (EU).

A privacy panel has issued a report urging the top search engines like Google, MSN and Yahoo! to delete the stored data of users after a stipulated period. A person’s IP address is considered to be personal information by the panel. It has recommended to the search engines that information collected by them regarding users like search logs should be erased after six months. By doing so, the panel believes that their privacy can be protected. The measure would also avoid possible misuse of the data compiled, it feels.

The panel is not an authority in itself. However, what this report can do is prompt the EU executive commission to resort to stricter rules for protecting the users’ privacy. It states that the current rules under which the search engines fall date back to 1995. These let operators collect the users’ Internet Protocol addresses and gather search history information with cookies – a practice that needs to be controlled – as recommended by the panel.