Facebook On Collision Course With New EU Privacy Laws 195
An anonymous reader writes "Facebook and other U.S. internet companies are faced with a new EU data protection regime, the Christian Science Monitor reports. U.S. concepts of free expression and commerce will battle European support for privacy and state legislation. 'Companies must understand that if they want access to 500 million consumers in the EU, then they have to comply. This is not an option,' said a spokesman for the EU Justice Commissioner."
U.S. concepts of free expression (Score:2, Funny)
"U.S. concepts of free expression" wow!
Re:U.S. concepts of free expression (Score:5, Insightful)
Not to mention the strange use of the words "regime" and "battle" and the Orwellian language of the article. But what did we expect from the Christian Science Monitor? While on the one hand winning multiple Pulitzers, and being fairly left-right neutral, it is well known for its corporate bias. The EU data protection laws won't harm freedom of expression as defined in the First Amendment, but will prevent companies from making a profit of selling private user data. Hence, the CSM wants to agitate against that, but because of its readership it cannot do so by simply stating this. The result is this article.
Re:U.S. concepts of free expression (Score:5, Insightful)
Freedom of expression as defined in the First Amendment is irrelevant in Europe. It wouldn't matter if EU data protection laws violated that amendment. At the end of the day, US companies have to decide if they want access to the market in the EU area or not.
In a conflict between privacy and commerce (Score:2)
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alternate version: when it comes to money and something, money always wins.
privacy, freedom, even product quality. money money money. long term thinking? no! that does not help me *now* (their thinking).
anything that brings in money is what our system is setup to optimize for.
I declare it to be broken by its very design.
but go and try to redesign it. they'll call you names and even attempt to silence you.
It's about time (Score:5, Insightful)
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and consumers have to understand that not everything is for free and maybe free sites should start charging for usage
Re:It's about time (Score:5, Insightful)
that may be but users should not have to dig through mountains of legaleze to understand that the service is offered to them ONLY because they agree to let complete strangers comprehensively know every last interaction they make with the service, potentially exposing to those people more about their lives than even the user knows about themselves.
It's not just counting clicks, it's building an entire psychology about each person, beyond reasonable survey-like data gathering. *THAT* little detail is what the users should be very weary of.
Re:It's about time (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:It's about time (Score:4, Informative)
Facebook have pretty effective facial recognition software, which, although the results are not enabled for general use, they presumably run photos through it anyway? If your face appears in one or more pictures or your name is mentioned, no matter if you are tagged or have an account, they can start to build a profile about you. Every time you are mentioned, or tagged, they can tie more disparate facts together..
If all this is distasteful for EU citizens, well Facebook is a US company and they can just export the data to the US and do whatever they like, right? Except now they are told that they cannot export data. Seems fair to me
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From up close I've seen this happen, my family is strongly against feeding information hoarding sites like FB and Twitter but some far off cousin decided to go on line to relieve her heart about the death of our grandmother and the illness o
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What does that have to do with respecting privacy laws? Oh, right ... nothing.
If Facebook can't compete while respecting local privacy laws, that's their problem. Someone else will fill the gap - not that it matters much in the long run - all the so-called "social media" will be dead within a decade or so, when technology gets to the point that everyones' devices become their own "perso
Re:It's about time (Score:5, Insightful)
Corporations will still want to build privacy invasive data bases and mine that information. Privacy laws means that not matter what type of business you, when you hold other peoples data you will have to adhere to those laws and when you are caught out you will be subject to prosecution.
Facebook has become a glaring example of privacy invasion. Facebook will also have to start thinking about it's users invading the privacy of other users and posting information that contravenes privacy laws.
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This will get resolved when someone sues facebook and wins big time for invading their privacy.
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And no, they didn't come out and say "fix this or you're going to be blocked", but rather strongly hinted "either we sit down and talk about this or it's a 15,000 fine per user per incident". Since every page access is one incident, that works out to more than
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Someone else will fill the gap
And get paid for their efforts how? The key is that FaceBook gets money from selling information and virtually no other source of revenue exists for them. Advertising simply isn't lucrative enough to support more than a couple of hobbists.
No, the services will simply not be available to EU citizens, or anywhere else that blocks the sale of information.
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Okay - in that case, let Canadian pharmacies sell drugs over the Internet to Americans. And weed.
Let Mexican drug lords sell crack. After all, it's not like either their laws or yours can prevent it.
Facebook has 2 choices - either operate within the law of
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I sense some optimism in your post. My understanding is, in US they are pretty much free to do what they want. The only thing that delays them a little are occasional outrage bursts (beacon program that got scrapped, timeline
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Can't say I miss any of them either.
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'rights' are what people, collectively, define and assign. (lets assume there is no higher power and that all our doing is our own making and design).
companies have taken what we allow them to. we are at least half to blame.
case in point: I was on a coupon/deals forum, reading some of the comments of the younger crowd on one of the freebies. some vendor was giving away 'free frenchfries' if you text them (sigh). they are collecting your info and you'll do that for, what, half a dollar's worth of fried p
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We *can* fight back. We have the old s
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Google and FaceBook exist solely because it is legal in the US to collect this information and sell it. If it wasn't legal to begin with, the services would not exist. There is no comparable source of revenue for a "free" service - ten years ago it was clear advertising wasn't the way to make lots of money.
Now the EU wants to change the rules. It will be interesting to see what happens. My guess it that these services will simply be unavailable to anyone that lives in a country that denies the company t
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Considering that facebook as an entity exists only with the whim of laws, they have NO natural rights. And these laws make it clear that they don't possess those legal rights, either, at least in the EU.
regime ? (Score:5, Insightful)
... U.S. internet companies are faced with a new EU data protection "regime" ...
newspeak ? the word "regime" should be used at EU Govts. ?
mmaaaa... EU are axis of evil "regimes", they do not let our companies do douchebaggery which is our way of life !!! they want accountability... !!! how dare they !!!
Re:regime ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nothing but newspeak!
"U.S. concepts of free expression and commerce will battle European support for privacy and state legislation."
I think what the summary is trying to say that company coming from corporation-controlled US will suddenly encounter an actual user-privacy law. There is nothing about free expression (though something about commerce) in selling user's data to everyone who is willing to buy it. Even if corporations are (apparently) people, selling their user's data is not free expression of speech.
Re:regime ? (Score:5, Insightful)
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I was going to comment the same thing, but then I realized something. They are are talking about removing other people's posts about you. I.e. someone posts a compromising picture about you and you want it removed. That, arguably, fits the definition of censorship.
Re:regime ? (Score:5, Insightful)
European parliament is elected, the commission (government) isn't elected directly, it is appointed by the parliament. Still, we have a choice of more than two parties.
And yes, everybody is "forced" to use Facebook. Most people get tagged on photos sooner or later, even if they don't have an account. FB finds out information you might not be willing to release: birthday, phone numbers, where you live, who your friends are, what your password for your mail account is... if a friend releases that information about you, it doesn't even require an intervention, decision on your part.
Re:regime ? (Score:4, Funny)
Then you have shitheads for friends if they're giving out your information without your permission...
See? Now you're releasing information about my friends
Re:regime ? (Score:4, Informative)
The main point is that the EU is planning on introducing the "right to be forgotten", that is if you terminate your Facebook account, they have to delete the data you uploaded.
The parliament is directly elected, they in turn together with the local governments elect the Commission. The Commission does intact have the same legitimacy as most parliamentary governments.
You thought wrong about what you believe the EU to be about, since the founding the purpose has been to lay a foundation for peace in Europe by slowly federating the member states.
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The main point is that the EU is planning on introducing the "right to be forgotten", that is if you terminate your Facebook account, they have to delete the data you uploaded.
It's more than that. They won't be able to build shadow profiles on people, and presumably if you delete your account will also have to delete all the tags in photos people made with your name on and so forth. At the moment if you do some stupid survey and the results go on your friends wall, then you delete your account, the results are still there on their page. Those will have to go.
You thought wrong about what you believe the EU to be about, since the founding the purpose has been to lay a foundation for peace in Europe by slowly federating the member states.
People forget that there were serious discussions about merging the UK and France into one country in the 60s. It was only
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People forget that there were serious discussions about merging the UK and France into one country in the 60s.
That sounded interesting and I empathize with being lazy [guardian.co.uk].
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The word regime has multiple meanings.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/regime [merriam-webster.com]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regime [wikipedia.org]
The article title clearly means "set of conditions" or "regimen" in this context.
CSM is one of very few English newspapers left with a high-school level of language. I'd prefer to keep it that way, though seeing your post get modded to +5 makes it clear why other newspapers are now written at middle school or even grade school reading levels.
It should be noted that... (Score:4, Insightful)
...Facebook's first priority is no longer its users' privacy (if it ever had been). Its first priority now is making money from its shareholders. From advertising space to per-click charges for using its authentication protocols and other bits of code, Facebook has other avenues of revenue than selling user data. Having close on a billion accounts live right now is a bonus for Facebook, as it shows a more or less loyal customer base for any other company that seeks a captive target.
Hence, deeply personal data you might find on FB that might find its way into some other company's database or metric for them to use to tailor their product to a target consumer, is unlikely to be uniquely identifiable - it's infinitely more likely to be statistical in nature. The single most likely candidates for individual monitoring would be those already on watch lists or those who trip warning triggers (yes, there is tech out there to monitor even "closed" or spiderproofed websites: that the police in the UK can access locked down Facebook accounts (seen it) as though the pages were Wayback mirrored is evidence enough of that).
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from its shareholders? I meant *for* its shareholders! It's 8am, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!
Re:It should be noted that... (Score:4, Informative)
No no, you got it right. The current owners of Facebook are trying to get as much money out of future shareholders as they can. After the IPO is over they might start thinking about making money for them, but at the moment it's all about inflating the percieved value of the company.
Re:It should be noted that... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's stuff like this that advertisers - and anyone else with "preferential access" (police, etc.) get. Think of it - others have a more complete history of your browsing habits than you do. Facebook is the new cyber-stalker.
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Okay. I know about those (and so do many geeks).
I view Facebook as a necessary evil to my social life. I get a lot of good out of it. There's also, of course, the whole tracking schtick, and on certain sites I visit that doesn't sit entirely well with me.
What's the geek's solution to neutralizing the Like button but being able to re-enable it when desired? Adblock? Noscript? hosts/etc.?
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The proper way to implement this is on each website - they would have to replace facebook's code with their own image of the like b
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[sarcasm]Yeah, Facebook started out as a shining beacon of user's privacy and gradually became corrupted by the allure of ad selling.[/sarcasm>]. The only thing that prevented them from selling data on the first day is that they probably didn't have enough of it until the user-base grew. Any why aren't there any laws in US providing some protection to the users and their data? If Europe seems to have some
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Its first priority now is making money for its shareholders.
Not even that. The first priority is always top executives' pay. Stock price is merely a tool to get that. And long-term profit is not even on the radar.
Government and Corporations are not The People (Score:5, Informative)
As I have been saying for years now, if you really want to look at the demographics of the United States, you really have to consider the citizens and the Federal government separately, because the Federal government has been so completely out of touch with the wants and needs of the average citizen.
"U.S. concepts of free expression and commerce", if by that you mean the vast majority of people who live here, very much do include personal privacy. Anyone who thinks otherwise has a distorted view of what's really going on. And anyone who represents the Federal government's "views" as those of the average American citizen is likewise out of touch.
Re:Government and Corporations are not The People (Score:4, Insightful)
Sometimes, I get a real charge out of the quality of "conversation" on Slashdot. Other times, like now, I am reminded that while it might be better than average, there are still some real bozos here. (squeak, squeak)
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Which is why I and many other browse at -1 and do our best to correct stuff like this when we can.
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-1 Flamebait (Score:5, Interesting)
Was this summary explicitly written in trollspeak to ignite yet another US vs Europe flamewar on /. ?
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Funny, I thought the free market economy was a Minoan concept...
Targeted advertising. (Score:5, Interesting)
I never understood the objection to targeted advertising. I don't particularly enjoy sitting through adds for tampons, dating services, or political candidates. But I quite like ads for electronics, camping gear, movies, cars and things like that. So why wouldn't I want a website to know what kinds of ads interest me? Targeted ads are greatly preferable to general ads.
I'll be in favor of a "right to be forgotten" if it applies to the government and banks. Otherwise, it's not really worth it.
Re:Targeted advertising. (Score:5, Insightful)
- your name
- your phone number, and the names and phone numbers of all your contacts
- your web history
- your web search history
- your past and current email
- your gps position, its history, and the places you "starred"
- the pictures you take with your phone
- your wifi passwords
- the music you bought online
- the books you read online
- your investments portfolio
- the office documents you're working on
- everything you "liked" on the web, be it apps, music, cuisine or politics
under just the promise that they'll never be doing anything bad with that data, except "targeted advertising"?
Even their ability to sell some of that data, purged of personal identifications, is "bad" enough for me. If advertisers get to know where you work and what you like, that's enough to understand who you are in many cases.
Re:Targeted advertising. (Score:4, Insightful)
Which is bad because then they'd be able to try to sell you stuff you might actually want, rather than a bunch of stupid crap you don't care about? I just don't see it.
As far as your list goes, I have no illusions that government legislation can protect any information I would voluntarily choose to share. Best case scenario: corporations store and trade the information secretly. So, if you have something and you want to keep it private, the only way to do that is to keep it to yourself. Anyone who tells you differently is trying to sell you something.
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No, it's bad because an "advertiser" can be just anyone, including somebody who is interested in obtaining my personal information instead of selling me stuff, or some company who won't protect at all my personal data against misuse, for example by one of their own employees who has something against me.
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If someone has a personal vendetta against you, and they use information to blackmail you or whatever, there are already laws in place you can use to sue them. Pushing for regulations to prevent private corporations from having personal infomation is misguided, as the principle collectors of this kind of information (governments and banks) will be largely immune from it and are still employing thousands of regular people. If your regulations are missing most of the potential offenders, all they really do is
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It's true that you can only sue after your reputation's been destroyed. But these proposed regulations wouldn't change that.
Not only are they immune, they are required to hold the information for a period of time.
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Also, your version of "best cas
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That's be best result your silly regulations will be able to achieve. In reality, they won't achieve even that because they will include loopholes and exemptions.
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But aside from that, your statements have become increasingly close to incoherent. Try again when you sober up.
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I think it comes down to if people are old (and educated?) enough to remember Stasi.
I grew up in the 80s with East/West Germany next door and history lessons teaching us horrible things about what government can do with too much information.
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(allcaps)
But SOMEONE ELSE can give it away in your place!
Glad I got that of my chest, hehe.
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There isn't any. No one is complaining about google ads in gmail. Hulu has "ad tailor" that asks you about ad relevance. Absolutely no outrage about that (even nice to have sometimes)
I think the problem comes when my information is handed out to someone else. Beacon program posted blockbuster rental information on users accounts for others to see. And I guess the information is being made available without users consent?
Google got it sorted out (Score:3, Insightful)
"It's your data" so if you want us to delete your GPS locations
crossreferenced with your search habits you will have to give
up your gmail.
All in the new simplified agreement that covers everything.
Re:Google got it sorted out (Score:4, Insightful)
In the old world of business, the service provider received something of direct value in exchange for the service and the customer could reasonably expect to end the contract and stop paying. In the new model, the customer has something of indirect value irreversibly taken away (privacy) there's no reasonable prospect of getting it back even if they do agree to give up the service at a later date. Privacy is like virginity - when it's gone, it's gone.
Directive in conflict with Patriot Act? (Score:5, Interesting)
Corrected that for you (Score:5, Insightful)
Should read
The EU legislation has NOTHING to do with freedom of speech. The summary is busy trying to paint a red herring argument where there is none, just to stir up good old "Proud American" sentiment.
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Of course it has free speech implications. What it the EU going to do, censor web sites that don't live up to their privacy laws? How is that any different from SOPA that would censor web sites that don't adhere to certain US copyright laws?
Time to invade Europe (Score:2)
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Easier to just break away from Europe.
Interesting POV (Score:5, Interesting)
'Companies must understand that if they want access to 500 million consumers in the EU, then they have to comply. This is not an option,' said a spokesman for the EU Justice Commissioner."
The EU is essentially claiming that accessibility of a site to EU users subjects the site to EU laws. That's the same argument that the US uses to go after overseas sites that violate US law. While privacy is certainly a valid concern, the overall concept is a dangerous one. If a company doesn't have a physical prince in a location should it be subject to local laws? Should the government where it is located enforce foreign judgements?
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The difference is that Facebook has a presence in Europe. If Europe would just block Facebook instead of making them liable, that would be an invasion of free speech and the free net.
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The difference is that Facebook has a presence in Europe. If Europe would just block Facebook instead of making them liable, that would be an invasion of free speech and the free net.
True, but the EU apparently wants to exercise jurisdiction even if a company has no physical presence in the EU:
On Jan. 25, EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding unveiled a wide-ranging data protection program that aims to regulate all companies doing business online in the EU, not just those based there. The data protection laws, which will take about a year to be enacted, will be uniform across all 27 member states.
"Companies must understand that if they want access to 500 million consumers in the EU, then they have to comply. This is not an option," says Matthew Newman, spokesperson for the justice commissioner.
The EU essentially wants to exercise the same type of extra-territorial reach as the US. While people amy like the privacy implications, that stance has a far broader implication that is worrisome.
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The EU is not led by Viviane Reding alone. The opinion of one Justice Commissioner is not the official opinion of the Union. In fact, the "leadership" of the EU is so complex and changes so frequently that talking about what the EU wants is meaningless until something actually happens. The EU is a constant political battlefield of different groups with different interests.
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The EU is not led by Viviane Reding alone. The opinion of one Justice Commissioner is not the official opinion of the Union. In fact, the "leadership" of the EU is so complex and changes so frequently that talking about what the EU wants is meaningless until something actually happens. The EU is a constant political battlefield of different groups with different interests.
I realize that - it is much like the US was before we went to a strong federal system. None the less, the argument put forth is not necessarily good even if the privacy angle is.
And? (Score:2)
the Iranization of Europe (Score:3)
the other option is that, the EU standing pat, the rest of the civilized world passes them by. and the EU becomes like Iran, isolated by their own paranoias.
Why all the negative comments? (Score:2)
I would have thought Slashdot would be supportive of attempts to allow people to control over their private personal data? In my opinion, people who give personal data to any organisation in order for them to provide a service should have the right to ensure that the data is not kept or sold when the person no longer requires the service. Also a person should be protected against organisations collecting data without them being aware for commercial gain. I can finally cancel my Facebook account and actually
Profit more holy than privacy? (Score:2)
From TFA:
Mr. Rosen says the regulations will create a dramatic clash between the right to freedom of expression and the right to privacy, arguing that under the proposal, websites like Facebook will be obliged to not only to delete on request material that users upload, such as photos, but any shared copies of photos – and potentially even material uploaded by third parties that another user objects to.
Funny, when private persons want to prevent others from sharing their media, they call it "preventing free expression". I never heard the mainstream media call it that when corporations want to prevent others from sharing their media.
Is the right to keep your own media to yourself less important if you do it for privacy, than if you you do it for profit?
What Facebook can offer the EU? (Score:2)
Let's wait a while and see how this turns out...
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The problem here boils down to "we make more money with this scheme than your piddly little fines can ever hope to 'punish' us",
Piddly as in what Microsoft faced in 2006 [bbc.co.uk]? Admittedly, that situation was different but that kind of fines are not what I think of as "piddly".
and "we're not even based in your country, so your laws mean precisely as much as we allow them to"
How come Google are bending over backwards to follow chinese censoring laws? Google is based in US too and by your argument the should not have to care about those laws at all - yet they do.
Agreed - and that is indeed why I do not have a Facebook login.
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"Piddly as in what Microsoft faced in 2006? ..."
Ahem... Yes, "piddly". When Bill Gates personally, much less Microsoft, is worth over $60 BILLION, a fine of $357 Million is "piddly". The purpose of such fines it to be "punitive" and "preventative", which means that they are supposed to demonstrate that it is unproductive for companies to engage in such practices. But when the results are not high enough to be "preventative" -- as they have generally not been for many years -- they do not discourage such practices at all! Instead, they simply share the we
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[...]
Agreed - and that is indeed why I do not have a Facebook login.
And still, if you have enough friends with a FB login, lots of your private information is already in FB. They're very good at this.
It is simply you which don't understand (Score:5, Informative)
Effectively, if facebook ignore those law / pretend they are an US company They will simply LOSE that EU market completely , as they will serve people but won't be able to do much with the data. This is why your "routing around the damage" won't work : that data in the very end is for local consumption. If the local (the firm buying the data) knows they can't use the data, then facebook is SOL and no matter how much routing or where they put their server.
So yes, for facebook it would be a pretty bad deal.
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The new regulations recently proposed by the European Commision can result in fines of up to 2% of revenues. Not profits, revenues. That's not puddly by anyone's definition.
Additionally, the EU is perfectly willing to prevent EU companies from dealing with non-EU companies who don't comply. If FaceBook doesn't have EU advertisers on their system, all EU users suddenly become a drain on FaceBook resources for no gain. Yet if they leave the market, previously 2nd-rate competitors (such as Google+) get a huge
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"we're not even based in your country, so your laws mean precisely as much as we allow them to"
They do have a footprint in Europe, which is why they had the Irish Data Commissioner crawling around for 3 months last year. Multinational means multi-juristictional too, something to do with having your cake and eating it.
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"Multinational means multi-jurisdictional too, something to do with having your cake and eating it." [spelling corrected]
Actually, that is not the case at all. In a very real sense (and completely aside from the whole "cloud computing" hype), the Internet can be considered to be an information resource that is simply "out there", for anybody who wants to to visit.
It is not "intrusive" in any way. If countries want to block it, they have both the facilities and ability to block it.
Instead, what they have done is to try to force EVERYTHING on the internet to be the "lowest common denominator", and show only content that i
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"Multinational means multi-jurisdictional too, something to do with having your cake and eating it." [spelling corrected]
Actually, that is not the case at all.
A multinational corporation - by definition - operates in multiple nations, and hence under multiple legal jurisdictions.
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"A multinational corporation - by definition - operates in multiple nations, and hence under multiple legal jurisdictions."
Yes, but my point was that there is nothing FORCING anybody to be multi-national or multi-jurisdictional. One of my own websites, for example, resides on a server in a particular country, and it's nobody else's f**ing business. It is available for anyone in any country to view, and if they don't want to look, they don't have to. They do not have any right to tell me what to say or do, or the companies that host my site, or my ISP, etc.
Censorship, if it exists at all, is PURELY jurisdictional, whereas the
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"we make more money with this scheme than your piddly little fines can ever hope to 'punish' us", and "we're not even based in your country, so your laws mean precisely as much as we allow them to"
1. They have the power to fine by an unlimited amount, and the power to increase the original fine over time if the company in question does not become compliant. No corporation has carried out your proposed strategy of just paying the fines - even Microsoft - because it would be stupid.
2. Facebook International is based in Dublin, Ireland, which is part of the E.U..
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Hey Zuckerberg, you sure talk a good fight.
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the fact that a specific website is accessible from country XYZ, does NOT mean this website must comply with the local laws of country XYZ.
This certainly is not a new discussion — there's plenty written and opined about the applicability of one country's laws (and the jurisdiction of courts) to services made available from other countries, generally under the title of "private international law" or "conflict of laws."
In terms of the law in the EU, at least as between Member States, the Court of
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Re:The EU Justice Commissioner must understand... (Score:5, Insightful)
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I don't CARE where a site is hosted. The only thing that affects is the process for issuing a copyright takedown order or legal action.
EVERY INTERNET COMPANY IS REQUIRED TO ABIDE BY THE LAWS OF IT'S CUSTOMER NATIONS.
Your option is to abide by the laws and regulations of the nations where your customers and users are, or to be blocked from those markets for non-compliance.
That applies to EVERYONE in the world, not just US companies.
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Perfectly OK then, since Facebooks customers are the Advertisers.
Since no European advertiser would be willing to be Facebooks customer, since it would be illegal for him to use the private data Facebook stores about their European products, Facebook would pretty much no longer be interested in acquiring and keeping new European products. Problem solved.
Facebook could either decide to keep buying infrastructure to keep their European products in storage with no chance of ever selling it, or to stop investin
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EVERY INTERNET COMPANY IS REQUIRED TO ABIDE BY THE LAWS OF IT'S CUSTOMER NATIONS.
Your option is to abide by the laws and regulations of the nations where your customers and users are, or to be blocked from those markets for non-compliance.
That applies to EVERYONE in the world, not just US companies.
That's easy to say but it has serious implications - should a site be subject to penalties because it hosts material that violates one country's laws even if the material is legal in the location the material is hosted? For example, lets suppose a company is in country A and has users in country B. What if a site publishes material, in servers located in country A, that country B viewed as damaging and was gotten through illegal means (based on country B's laws). Should the site be liable to prosecution in
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Re:The site belongs to facebook. (Score:5, Insightful)
The site belongs to facebook. It is hosted in the US.
Facebook International HQ is in Dublin, Ireland - which is part of the E.U. They are also currently building a massive data center in Sweden [guardian.co.uk] which will handle all traffic from Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
This idea of trying to regulate what people do with the devices they own is simply laughable.
Welcome to the real world, where there are regulations governing businesses, and regulations that cover many of the devices that businesses use. You may also want to educate yourself regarding some of the reasons that Europeans generally support pro-privacy and anti-data-collection laws. [wikipedia.org] You may be surprised to learn that it was a trade union [wikipedia.org] that rose up against the communists and fought for the first free democratic elections in eastern Europe.
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Personal responsibility. Corporate responsibility. It takes a lack of both for privacy to be violated. And it sure seems that between Facebook users and Facebook, there is a lack of both. But either users or the company can fix it. That's why you don't see me on Facebook (well, at least not under my own name).