Regarding Impersonation-Like Displays, Search-Result Obstruction, and Damage to the Author’s Moral Rights, Honor, and Credibility

To Google’s Legal Department,
To Google LLC,
To Google Japan,

I am the author of The Turntable of Civilization.
I continue my work under the name MIKIO KISARA through my official website, Hatena Blog, Ameba Blog, YouTube, photographic works, and various essays and commentaries.

This letter is an open and formal request to Google’s Legal Department to confirm and correct the possibility that my authorship, former pen name, and current author and creator name are being confused through impersonation-like conduct, search-result obstruction, defamation, unauthorized reproduction, and inaccurate associations in Google Search, related displays, AI responses, Knowledge panels, and other Google services.

On the official website page titled Regarding the Author Name “Kenji Akutagawa” of The Turntable of Civilization and MIKIO KISARA, I have clearly stated the following facts.

The Turntable of Civilization is one continuous body of authorship carried on by MIKIO KISARA, including the social commentary formerly written under the pen name “Kenji Akutagawa,” the Hatena Blog, the Ameba Blog, the official website, photographic works, YouTube works, and various essays and commentaries.

The Facebook account under the name “Kenji Akutagawa” that is not managed by me is not mine.

It is not an account operated by the author of The Turntable of Civilization.

To treat that account as being connected with MIKIO KISARA, or with the author of The Turntable of Civilization, is inaccurate.

I began publishing on the internet on July 16, 2010.

The reason was the unbelievable confusion surrounding the redevelopment project of Osaka Umeda North Yard.

I believed that this was a matter of serious importance for Japan and that it was necessary to alert as many people as possible within the country.

Therefore, in order to reach the widest possible readership, I continued to publish the same writings every day on three platforms: goo Blog, operated at the time by an NTT-affiliated company, Ameba Blog, and FC2 Blog.

At that time, FC2 Blog had a system by which it was possible to see where visitors were accessing from.

Through that system, I confirmed that people at the center of Japan, people forming the core of the country, were reading my writings day after day.

In other words, my online activity did not begin as a mere personal diary.

It began as a serious appeal to Japanese society.

About a month and a half after I began publishing online, a certain individual appeared before me.

This person had been arrested for defrauding a local bank of 150 million yen, and the case had been prominently reported by a major newspaper.

For no reason other than the fact that he lived near a prime building owned by my company, he came, while out on bail, with three people including himself, to my company’s office on the fourth floor of that building.

He stated, in substance, that due to urgent circumstances, the owner of a nearby building he was renting had offered to return the entire security deposit if he agreed to vacate by the end of the month; that he had heard my company had a vacant office space of about twenty tsubo; that he wished to move in desks and other equipment by the end of the month; and that the security deposit and rent would be paid as soon as the previous building owner returned the money to him.

I accepted his request not as a real-estate operator, but as a writer and as a human being.

Six months later, it became painfully clear that this had been a grave mistake.

During those six months, he paid not a single yen in rent or security deposit.

Moreover, through false stories involving air-conditioning equipment, he induced me to pay more than three million yen.

Ultimately, I was defrauded of a large sum of money almost equal to the amount he had previously defrauded from the local bank.

During those six months, this person visited my office almost every day and continued telling stories, 99 percent of which were false, in order to deceive us and gain our trust.

He skillfully inserted into those stories the name of a condominium development company president with whom I was extremely close, and thereby completely won our confidence.

This person operated a company engaged in internet-related business.

That was one of the few true things he told us.

One day, he said the following, in substance, in front of us:

“My company also had a department that accepted website production work. However, we did not merely produce websites. This society is a competitive society. Our clients had competing companies and competing products. We knew how to lower the search ranking of those competing company names and product names, and how to place our client’s company name or product name at the top, or near the top, of the search results. From here on, I cannot say more, because it is a trade secret.”

Years later, I came to understand that at least some of such methods appear to fall within the category now known as reverse SEO attacks, search-result manipulation, or search-result pollution.

Therefore, the large-scale search-result obstruction that I began to suffer around June 1, 2011 did not arise suddenly or by coincidence.

My authorship had been read as a socially influential body of writing since my appearance on the internet on July 16, 2010.

In that process, I encountered a person who himself stated that he knew methods for manipulating search rankings and pushing competitors down in search results, and I actually suffered serious fraud damage from him.

Then, around June 1, 2011, an extremely malicious search-result obstruction began against my authorship, involving hundreds of blog IDs, search-result pollution, unauthorized reproduction, and mass creation of pages combining meaningless strings of words with portions of my writings.

Regarding the large-scale search-result obstruction that began around June 1, 2011, I filed a criminal complaint with the police station having jurisdiction.

That criminal complaint was formally accepted, and an investigation was opened.

In the course of that investigation, the individual concerned confessed to the police detective that all of these acts had been committed by him.

I have preserved the related records and evidence.

The search-result obstruction consisted of creating hundreds of IDs on a blog platform, producing a large number of malicious blogs, and inserting one chapter of my work without authorization into meaningless strings of words.

These malicious blogs polluted the upper search results.

As a result, the number of search results relating to my work dropped to less than one-hundredth of its previous level, causing serious damage to my authorship, my connection with readers, and my social credibility.

Then, around November 2017, a Facebook account under the name “Kenji Akutagawa” appeared.

I am convinced that this account is also connected with the same individual, or the same line of conduct, as the search-result obstruction that began in June 2011 and the defamatory acts that were carried out on Twitter.

I ask Google’s Legal Department:

If, in Google Search, related displays, AI responses, Knowledge panels, or other Google services, a Facebook account under the name “Kenji Akutagawa” that is not managed by me, or information derived from it, is confused with myself, my former pen name, my authorship, or my current author name MIKIO KISARA, how does Google treat this as a legal and policy matter?

Even though I clearly present my official information on my own official website, if inaccurate third-party information is mixed into search results, AI responses, or related displays, and if that information divides or confuses my authorship, is this not a matter relating to the author’s moral rights, honor, credibility, name attribution, business interference, and impersonation damage?

Google provides systems for legal removal requests and policy-violation reports.

However, the pollution of search results as a whole, the misuse of a former pen name by a third party, impersonation-like displays, the inclusion of false information in AI responses, and the division of an author’s continuing body of work cannot be resolved merely by removing a single URL.

This is a structural problem concerning how Google Search and Google-related services recognize and display my identity, the continuity of my authorship, and the relationship between my former pen name and my current author name.

I ask Google’s Legal Department to answer the following points.

First: Under Google’s policies, is it appropriate for an account under the name “Kenji Akutagawa,” which is not managed by me, to be reflected in search results, related displays, AI responses, or other Google services in a way that may suggest a connection with myself or with the author of The Turntable of Civilization?

Second: When the author himself clearly states on his official website the former pen name, the current name, the continuity of authorship, and the fact that certain accounts are not managed by him, how does Google verify and reflect that official information in search results, AI responses, and related displays?

Third: When an abnormal condition appears to have recurred that is similar to a past search-result obstruction for which a criminal complaint was formally accepted, an investigation was opened, and the individual concerned confessed, does Google treat this merely as a matter of search ranking, or as a possible case of malicious search-result obstruction, impersonation, and defamation?

Fourth: When the search results of a specific author are polluted by unauthorized reproduction, meaningless text, false blogs, mass creation of spam-like pages, or misuse of a former pen name, what investigative, exclusionary, and corrective measures does Google take?

Fifth: If Google Search, AI responses, Knowledge panels, and related displays, as a result, assist or prolong impersonation, defamation, search-result obstruction, and the division or distortion of an author’s continuing work, how does Google understand its legal responsibility and corporate responsibility?

Google is not merely a provider of a search service.

Google is a social infrastructure company that controls the circulation of information on a global scale.

Its displays directly affect an author’s honor, credibility, accessibility of works, connection with readers, and public evaluation.

Therefore, if inaccurate third-party information, impersonation-like displays, or confusing information continue to be mixed into search results and AI responses while the author’s own official information is not properly prioritized, Google should not evade responsibility by describing it simply as an algorithmic result.

I request that Google’s Legal Department promptly confirm and correct the matter, taking into account the facts stated on my official website, the preserved evidence, the history of the accepted criminal complaint, the confession by the individual concerned, the existence of the Facebook account not managed by me, and the current abnormal search results.

This open letter is hereby issued to Google’s Legal Department as a formal public question.

MIKIO KISARA
Author of The Turntable of Civilization