What about EU citizens residing outside the EU? Banning visits from EU aren't avoiding the GDPR problem.
GDPR: US news sites unavailable to EU users over data protection rules
81–90 of 680 posts
Re: GDPR: US news sites unavailable to EU users over data protection rules
#82...and little of value was lost. American news sites are overwhelmingly filled with nonsense.
But really, I’m surprised they even bother to block EU users. Not like the GPDR can really be enforced in the US.
Re: GDPR: US news sites unavailable to EU users over data protection rules
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
I see this 'VPN' argument a lot, but it's wrong. If the Chicago Tribune tracks users accessing their site through a VPN, without informed consent, they are in violation. Art 3 para 2 in b makes the Regulation apply to them and doesn't make provisions about whether the controller or processor has a way to find out if the behaviour of the data subject takes place within the Union. I don't see any reason for a different…
The relevant language is in recital 24. “Factors such as the use of a language or a currency generally used in one or more Member States with the possibility of ordering goods and services in that other language, or the mentioning of customers or users who are in the Union, may make it apparent that the controller envisages offering goods or services to data subjects in the Union.” If the Chicago Tribune doesn't envi…
I've been served ads on US outlets for products which clearly target my home market (Germany). This will make a hard time arguing that you are not targeting that audience. In my opinion, if you serve ads on your site which target EU consumers, you're doing business here. I don't think it matters whether you do that through a third party.
By blocking EU ip-ranges, that may change, I admit that. However, if by other measures like finger-printing the browser you serve EU-specific ads to vpn'd users you may be up to problems.
Re: GDPR: US news sites unavailable to EU users over data protection rules
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
> clear signal they don't care Or, it could mean they hadn't realised how much work it'd take to be GDPR compliant, and decided to temporarily use geographical blocking until they can be compliant.
It took them 2 years to realise that? That’s the same as not caring.
When you have competing priorities and finite time and budget, people often don't investigate external requirements, assuming that they'll just comply when they no longer have a choice.
That's why the first few audits (SOX, PCI, etc...) for a company new to them, are always such a struggle, people starting to look at the months of work needed the same week the auditors are planned to come in.
edit/PS: Did you notice how many "We changed our policy" emails you've received in the past 2 weeks, including from very large international companies like google, yahoo, etc... Companies for which not being open for business in Europe would have financially impact. Probably a good indication that they ended up with a lot more work to comply that they had anticipated, and still made it just in time. Now imagine the same situation in smaller companies running on very thin resources that cannot afford a sudden increase in staff!
Re: GDPR: US news sites unavailable to EU users over data protection rules
#85Alternatively there's this: https://eu.usatoday.com/ No ads, no tracking, no cookies, not even Javascript. Just plain HTML+CSS and JPEG images. The whole front page is around 650 KByte, and by far most of this is in the image files. As a result the page looks very clean and loads very fast. This is what all news web sites should look like, not just for EU readers (although I fear that this is just a temporary solutio…
And how can be a business sustainable in this way?
Everything's fine if they add generic, non-targeted ads that are completely under control of the news publisher, hosted on their servers, don't track users, don't use cookies. Just like print media and TV does since forever.
Re: GDPR: US news sites unavailable to EU users over data protection rules
#86> News sites within the Tronc and Lee Enterprises media publishing groups were affected. > Tronc's high-profile sites include the New York Daily News, Chicago Tribune, LA Times, Orlando Sentinel and Baltimore Sun. Why would either of these papers be subject to the GPDR? Am I wrong in assuming they’re purely US based companies? Or is there a chain of ownership that includes EU jurisdiction?
If they have readers that are physically in the EU, then those readers would be covered by the GDPR.
Foreign laws are not enforceable in the US unless we a) have a treaty saying so and b) have an analogous law here. I see a lot of Europeans and tech bros that don’t seem to get this. They can make a law saying people or corporations must kiss the rings of every EU citizen no matter where they are or face fines... likewise not enforceable here, and hopefully that example makes that clear to you.
Re: GDPR: US news sites unavailable to EU users over data protection rules
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
And how can be a business sustainable in this way?
And how can be a business sustainable in this way? By not building their entire business around ads and tracking.
People have tried lots of other stuff in the last 10-15 years, it was not sustainable (micro-transactions never took off, subscription-based newspapers are the exception rather than the norm etc). I'm personally fine with newspapers like the LA Times collecting and selling my personal data as long as I can read articles for "free" on their website, I think it's a pretty fair deal.
Re: GDPR: US news sites unavailable to EU users over data protection rules
#88Alternatively there's this: https://eu.usatoday.com/ No ads, no tracking, no cookies, not even Javascript. Just plain HTML+CSS and JPEG images. The whole front page is around 650 KByte, and by far most of this is in the image files. As a result the page looks very clean and loads very fast. This is what all news web sites should look like, not just for EU readers (although I fear that this is just a temporary solutio…
And how can be a business sustainable in this way?
I have no answer to this, but the targetted ad business has driven traditional news outlets/traditional ads out of the market almost completely, so I think it has no good standing to ask for protection. In fact, I think GDPR proponents will welcome the collateral damage to targetted advertising.
Re: GDPR: US news sites unavailable to EU users over data protection rules
#89Well we still have HN, even if non-compliant.
Re: GDPR: US news sites unavailable to EU users over data protection rules
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
I see this 'VPN' argument a lot, but it's wrong. If the Chicago Tribune tracks users accessing their site through a VPN, without informed consent, they are in violation. Art 3 para 2 in b makes the Regulation apply to them and doesn't make provisions about whether the controller or processor has a way to find out if the behaviour of the data subject takes place within the Union. I don't see any reason for a different…
The relevant language is in recital 24. “Factors such as the use of a language or a currency generally used in one or more Member States with the possibility of ordering goods and services in that other language, or the mentioning of customers or users who are in the Union, may make it apparent that the controller envisages offering goods or services to data subjects in the Union.” If the Chicago Tribune doesn't envi…
>> "offering goods or services"
IANAL but it would seem pretty obvious that any content a visitor might seek on a website would fall under the rubric of "services." It seems like a tough position to argue that since e.g. the Chicago Tribune doesn't offer subscriptions denominated in Euros, that it isn't offering services ("news") globally.
The only thing that today makes clear is that this law is a mess, and it will take a lot of litigation before anybody really knows what it means.