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German court rules Facebook use of personal data illegal

reuters.com

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Re: German court rules Facebook use of personal data illegal

#71

Post by Trundle »

lima wrote: post #14
peoplewindow wrote: post #5

I think if I was creating a new social media website today I'd probably not set up any presence in the EU. The sheer quantity of fines for vaguely specified "crimes" being handed out makes it a deeply unattractive business environment and it seems to be getting worse. I remember when Facebook was new, one of its big competitive advantages was its easy and comprehensive privacy controls. I didn't see other social netw…

Deeply unattractive business environment for companies exploiting people's personal data without their consent? Good.

Mfw Giving them the data yourself isn't consent.

Re: German court rules Facebook use of personal data illegal

#72

Post by pavlov »

LanceH wrote: post #24
wickawic wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One way of thinking of legislation is to encourage/discourage behavior indirectly. Think how putting a ridiculous tax on cigarettes makes people less likely to want to use them. In this sense, the German government (and greater EU) may be completely fine in implementing these laws to discourage the presence of these types of companies operating in their jurisdiction. After all, it is hard to argue that social media a…

I think it is pretty easy to argue that someone has the freedom to put their info on a website that will use it according to the terms of service.

30 years ago everyone had the freedom to choose between restaurants that allow smoking and those that don’t — except that no businesses wanted to provide the latter. Without government intervention we’d still be wading through cigarette smoke in bars.

Facebook’s reckless use of private data is a public hazard not unlike passive smoking. It’s not going to be solved by an asymmetric fake free market where customers are free to choose an option that doesn’t exist.

Re: German court rules Facebook use of personal data illegal

#73

Post by code_duck »

TomMarius wrote: post #43
lima wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deeply unattractive business environment for companies exploiting people's personal data without their consent? Good.

You can stop using Facebook if you want to

That would be great if it were true, but even if you don’t use Facebook, that does not exclude you from their marketing activities. https://boingboing.net/2017/11/08/involuntary-profiling.html

Re: German court rules Facebook use of personal data illegal

#74

Post by jimnotgym »

twblalock wrote: post #45
waytogo wrote: post #18

Wait until GDPR is in place in May and German and other EU courts will rule FB to death. IDK how FB will ever be compliant with GDPR and survive that huge upcoming fines in the long term or in the worst case the withdrawal from these markets.

Here is a list of countries with the most Facebook users: https://www.statista.com/statistics/268136/top-15-countries-... The first EU country is #10, and it won't even be an EU country in a few years. I think Facebook would survive leaving the EU market just fine. I'm sure they really, really don't want to, but they could. Edit: updated link

Link is not working for me, but if you mean the UK

1) GDPR applies to the UK even if Brexit happens. It is already a matter of UK law. In fact it seems the UK is leading the way to GDPR adoption.

2) It is totally unclear that Brexit is going to cause any changes to the UK/EU regulatory arrangements in anything but name.

Re: German court rules Facebook use of personal data illegal

#76

Post by tobltobs »

TomMarius wrote: post #43
lima wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Deeply unattractive business environment for companies exploiting people's personal data without their consent? Good.

You can stop using Facebook if you want to

FB can stop to have a corporate presence in the EU.

Re: German court rules Facebook use of personal data illegal

#77

Post by yxhuvud »

nordsieck wrote: post #34
shadowtree wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1., If you store data of EU residents, you are under EU jurisdiction (GDPR) and can be targeted by fines. 2., The EU is a very rich, large market - considered the single largest economy in the world (GDP per capita). Good luck not targeting it with your products. 3., The pendulum around data protection is swinging back, this is normal. Apple saw it and adjusted already. Google is cooperating and staying quiet. Only F…

> 1., If you store data of EU residents, you are under EU jurisdiction (GDPR) and can be targeted by fines. Anyone can claim jurisdiction. Enforcement is another matter entirely. If there is no presence in Europe, I can't imagine how the they would collect.

Perhaps not so surprisingly, most people that would want to pay money for data on European data, resides in Europe. And if you receive payments from Europe, you are definitely in the jurisdiction.

Re: German court rules Facebook use of personal data illegal

#78

Post by s73v3r_ »

TomMarius wrote: post #46
imbusy111 wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the way we architect social networks online is fundamentally flawed? Maybe these products should not even exist. I'm not claiming I have a better solution though.

We have the answer - no, nothing's flawed, there's a huge demand.

I think it's a huge stretch to say that nothing is flawed.

Re: German court rules Facebook use of personal data illegal

#79

Post by lima »

twblalock wrote: post #45
waytogo wrote: post #18

Wait until GDPR is in place in May and German and other EU courts will rule FB to death. IDK how FB will ever be compliant with GDPR and survive that huge upcoming fines in the long term or in the worst case the withdrawal from these markets.

Here is a list of countries with the most Facebook users: https://www.statista.com/statistics/268136/top-15-countries-... The first EU country is #10, and it won't even be an EU country in a few years. I think Facebook would survive leaving the EU market just fine. I'm sure they really, really don't want to, but they could. Edit: updated link

Wrong link :-)

Re: German court rules Facebook use of personal data illegal

#80

Post by thinkloop »

A thought I was having recently: any communication medium (Messengers, social networks, email services, contact apps, etc) that does not use end-to-end encryption and has access to the data, may be in violation of privacy/data laws or moral obligation that will soon become law.

For example in email, people can, and do, send everything including documents with sensitive information, pii, account/payment numbers, etc. to each other - which are likely not being stored in pci compliant, and/or other responsible ways, by the providers.

Social networks run platforms that facilitate others to provide information about you when you did not agree: whether you're on Facebook or not, you're on Facebook.

Same with contact apps where you fill in all your friends' contact info then simply pass it all to a company without the consent of your contacts: mass legal doxxing.

Any communication medium where the platform has access to the contents of the communication might be susceptible to serious future legal/moral ramifications. There is a non-zero possibility that today's business models might be fully illegal at some point. Perhaps replaced by decentralization/encryption/privacy/crypto/etc.

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