Nowadays, there is a wide variety of content on the Internet. Sometimes you publish something you shouldn't publish—for example, you post a blog post in anger and regret it later; or you accidentally leak confidential data. In most cases, simply removing the content or restricting access will stop it from appearing in search results. However, if you're desperate to remove some unwanted content that's already indexed by Google, you can use our URL removal tool, which removes content from our search results as long as it meets certain criteria (discussed below). Delete quickly. We'll be publishing a series of blog posts teaching you how to successfully remove various types of content and how to avoid common mistakes. In this first blog post, I'll discuss some basic scenarios: deleting a single URL, deleting an entire directory or website, and re-adding deleted content.
Delete a single URL
Generally speaking, in order for a removal request to be successful, the owner of the URL in question - whether you or someone else - must provide consent for the content to be removed. For a single URL, there are three ways to indicate consent:
Block pages via robots.txt file to prevent them from being searched
Blocking pages via the noindex meta tag prevents them from being indexed
Indicates that the current page does not exist by returning a 404 or 410 status code
Before submitting a deletion request, you can first check whether the URL has been blocked:
robots.txt: Use the Fetch as Googlebot or Test robots.txt function in Webmaster Tools to check whether the URL has been denied access.
noindex meta tag: You can use Fetch as Googlebot to ensure that the meta tag appears between tags. If you want to view a page that cannot be verified using Webmaster Tools, you can open the URL in your browser, click View > Web Resources, and make sure the meta tag is between the tags.
404/410 status codes: You can use Fetch as Googlebot, or a tool like Live HTTP Headers or web-sniffer.net to confirm that the URL is indeed returning the correct code. Sometimes, a "deleted" page may display "404" or "Page cannot be found" but return a 200 status code in the header. So it’s a good idea to double-check using an appropriate header verification tool.
If you have removed unwanted content from a webpage but have not blocked the page using the above methods, you still cannot completely remove the URL from our search results. This is common if the content is posted on a website you don't own, and we'll talk about how to deal with this in part two of our series on removing URLs.
If a URL meets any of the above conditions, you can visit http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/removals , enter the URL you want to delete, and select the "Webmaster has blocked this page" option to remove it. its deleted. Note: You should enter the URL that contains the content, not the URL that Google searches for the content. For example, you should enter
http://www.example.com/embarrassing-stuff.html
rather than
http://www.google.com/search ? q=embarrassing+stuff
This article also details how to ensure you enter the correct URL. Remember, we won't be able to remove your unwanted content if you don't tell us the exact URL that's bothering you.
Delete an entire directory or website
To successfully delete an entire directory or website, access to the directory or website must be denied in the website's robots.txt file. For example, to delete the http://www.example.com/secret/ directory, the robots.txt file needs to contain:
User-agent: *
Disallow: /secret/
The root directory returns a 404 status code, but this is not enough because even if the directory returns a 404 status code, it is still possible to display files underneath. Using robots.txt to block a directory (or an entire website) can ensure that all URLs under the directory (or website) are blocked. You can use the Fetch as Googlebot or Test robots.txt functions in Webmaster Tools to test whether the directory is completely blocked.
Only verified site owners can request deletion of an entire site or directory in Webmaster Tools. To request deletion of a directory or website, first enter the relevant website, and then click Website Configuration > Crawler Access > Delete URL. If you are at the root of the site and wish to delete the URL, you will need to confirm that you wish to delete the entire site. If you are entering a subdirectory, you should select the "Delete Directory" option in the drop-down menu.
Add content again
You can cancel a request to remove your site at any time, including requests submitted by others. To do this, you must be a verified site owner in Webmaster Tools. Once you are verified, you can go to Site Configuration > Crawler Access > Delete URL (or > Submit by others) and click the "Cancel" button next to the request you want to cancel.
Still have questions? Stay tuned for updates as we continue our series of blog posts on how to remove content from Google search results.