A businessman has taken Google to the High Court in London in what is being seen as a milestone case over “the right to be forgotten”.

He is testing Google’s decision not to evacuate a criminal conviction he has from the 1990s from search results.

Individuals can ask for online information to be expelled from searches on the off chance that they feel it is obsolete or insignificant.

Google said it would “defend the public’s right to access lawful information”.

“We work hard to comply with the right to be forgotten, but we take great care not to remove search results that are clearly in the public interest and will defend the public’s right to access lawful information,” the firm said in a statement.

The search monster has been asked to delist about two million search results in Europe, and has expelled more than 800,000 of them.

The right to be forgotten is a lawful point of reference set by the Court of Justice of the European Union in 2014, after a case brought by Spaniard Mario Costeja Gonzalez, asking Google to expel information about his monetary history.

The UK case revolves around a businessman who wants Google to erase links to a criminal conviction for false bookkeeping in the late 1990s. His conviction is considered spent under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974.

The man can’t be named because of revealing restrictions surrounding the case.

The man is being represented by law office Carter-Ruck, which has yet to respond to requests for input.

The General Data Protection Regulation, a sweeping difference in EU information rules, is because of come into compel in May and aims to stretch out the law to make it easier for citizens to have content evacuated.

The present case is being heard by Mr Justice Warby and is relied upon to last several days.

A similar case is expected to be heard one month from now.