Why Big Data Could Sink Europe's 'Right To Be Forgotten' 128
concealment tips this news from GigaOm:
"Europe's proposed 'right to be forgotten' has been the subject of intense debate, with many people arguing it's simply not practical in the age of the internet for any data to be reliably expunged from history. Well, add another voice to that mix. The European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA) has published its assessment of the proposals (PDF), and the tone is skeptical to say the least. And, interestingly, one of the biggest problems ENISA has found has to do with big data. They say, 'Removing forgotten information from all aggregated or derived forms may present a significant technical challenge. On the other hand, not removing such information from aggregated forms is risky, because it may be possible to infer the forgotten raw information by correlating different aggregated forms.'"
the internet destroyed forgetting (Score:5, Informative)
not any government policy or commercial entity
they call it disruptive technology for a reason. like the printing press, or the gun, or the atom bomb, it dramatically changes the status quo
it's simple: if you don't want it to live forever, don't put it on the internet. if you put it on the internet, it lives for ever
that's about the truth of it
but i suppose many people out there are like music company executives trying to impose legal constructs from the cassette tape age on the internet: unwelcome to accept ugly reality on the subject
well i'm sorry, you need to accept this as reality, no matter your feelings
one other point: privacy is NOT dead
all you have to do is stop offering parts of your life to the internet
the insane part is feeding private parts of your life to the internet, and then whining about a lack of privacy
Re:It depends on who is asking. (Score:5, Informative)
Warning: cultural clash. In Europe, many rights cannot be signed away through TOS regardless of text in the aforementioned TOS. In US, you can even sign away your right to trial by jury.
As a result, attempts to cross-jury-rig comparisons are quite pointless.
Re:It depends on who is asking. (Score:5, Informative)
But you give Facebook a licence to use this data when you agree to their TOS. The data may have originated from you, but you transferred ownership of it in exchange for the services Facebook provided you with.
Not in the UK. British data protection laws hold that your data still belongs to you, even if its being held by another company. This is why that company needs your permission to sell it on. Of course, if it is illegally sold on without your permission and the seller lies to the buyer and tells them you authorised further sales then even if the buyer cares about the law, they may end up selling your data on even though you never gave that permission. (This happened to my data)
What is needed is a law that prevents dissemination of your data by a company who you haven't given explicit permission to directly.
If you want full control over your personal data, only sign up with services that gives you full control of the data.
This includes not signing up to any service that have a TOS that allows them to change their TOS.
Good luck finding such a service. For personal customers, contracts aren't negotiated, you don't have the option to strike out terms you don't like. And when so mant companies require you to permit them to use and sell your data in ways not directly associated with the services they provide, some regulation is needed to stop the public being railroaded into agreeing to this by virtue of having little choice.