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USA needs law 'a lot like GDPR' says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

theregister.co.uk

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Re: USA needs law 'a lot like GDPR' says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

#41

Post by empath75 »

epicmellon wrote: post #13
wyldfire wrote: post #3

A consumer protection law like GDPR would probably be a good thing for US, but it's hard not to see this as SFDC saying, "As a multibillion-dollar SaaS vendor, we welcome regulation that might slow down or prevent a competitor from unseating us."

That's exactly what this is. GDPR is untenable and creates magical rights where none exist. You don't own information about you. Data is data. The only reasonable thing I can see out of it is getting companies to clarify (simplify) their EULAs.

> That's exactly what this is. GDPR is untenable and creates magical rights where none exist.

That's pretty much how laws work.

Re: USA needs law 'a lot like GDPR' says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

#42

Post by zerostar07 »

epicmellon wrote: post #15

Can we just take a step back and admit that treating an IP address as personal information is patently ridiculous?

And then take one step forward and make them actually untraceable by requiring anonymization/obfuscation at the ISP level? Seriously the reason why GDPR considers them PII is because the ECJ has judged that if you have access to the ISP you can look them up.

https://www.whitecase.com/publications/alert/court-confirms-...

Re: USA needs law 'a lot like GDPR' says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

#43

Post by jkaplowitz »

mychael wrote: post #17

The US needs a law that exempts American businesses from GDPR if they have no presence in Europe.

GDPR only applies to American companies if they either have a presence in Europe (through an establishment or through a vendor processing personal data) or sufficiently deal with a clientele in Europe.

If the US tried to override the second part unilaterally, Europe would probably ban exempted companies from dealing with European customers unless they opted into GDPR or would otherwise fall out of scope without the exemption. They'd therefore have trouble dealing with European banks, shipping companies with a presence in Europe, etc.

Not to mention, what if Europe tried to exempt their companies from dealing with the annoying US laws? It would become a messy war of exemptions and consequences.

This game of "we're too special to have to follow your laws even if we want your customers en masse" is a dangerous game to play.

Re: USA needs law 'a lot like GDPR' says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

#44

Post by jrs95 »

xevb3k wrote: post #31
epicmellon wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly what this is. GDPR is untenable and creates magical rights where none exist. You don't own information about you. Data is data. The only reasonable thing I can see out of it is getting companies to clarify (simplify) their EULAs.

I used to think more like this. Then when I thought about it I decided that essentially all “ownership” rights are like this. Intellectual property and physical property laws are artificial. There is no basic right, they are all rights created where “none exist”. They can be useful though, and part of how we decide what kind of society we want to create. Seems like Europe has decided that privacy and control of data…

Considering that these rules don’t apply to governments, and that European governments generally seem to be slipping towards jailing people for thought crime, I’m skeptical as to how serious they are about privacy and control of personal data.

Re: USA needs law 'a lot like GDPR' says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

#45

Post by epicmellon »

xevb3k wrote: post #31
epicmellon wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly what this is. GDPR is untenable and creates magical rights where none exist. You don't own information about you. Data is data. The only reasonable thing I can see out of it is getting companies to clarify (simplify) their EULAs.

I used to think more like this. Then when I thought about it I decided that essentially all “ownership” rights are like this. Intellectual property and physical property laws are artificial. There is no basic right, they are all rights created where “none exist”. They can be useful though, and part of how we decide what kind of society we want to create. Seems like Europe has decided that privacy and control of data…

I 100% agree. The problem is that practically rights have to be reasonably respectable (able to be respected) by people at little cost to them. Like, it's not difficult for me to not steal something from you. Erasing everything I ever wrote down about you is difficult.

But also:

> Seems like Europe has decided that privacy and control of data personal data is something they want.

The problem here is that governments allow people to claim rights without bearing the cost of that claim (or at least hiding the cost).

Re: USA needs law 'a lot like GDPR' says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

#46

Post by epicmellon »

jrs95 wrote: post #44
xevb3k wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think more like this. Then when I thought about it I decided that essentially all “ownership” rights are like this. Intellectual property and physical property laws are artificial. There is no basic right, they are all rights created where “none exist”. They can be useful though, and part of how we decide what kind of society we want to create. Seems like Europe has decided that privacy and control of data…

Considering that these rules don’t apply to governments, and that European governments generally seem to be slipping towards jailing people for thought crime, I’m skeptical as to how serious they are about privacy and control of personal data.

Then there's that.

Re: USA needs law 'a lot like GDPR' says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

#47

Post by xmodem »

epicmellon wrote: post #13
wyldfire wrote: post #3

A consumer protection law like GDPR would probably be a good thing for US, but it's hard not to see this as SFDC saying, "As a multibillion-dollar SaaS vendor, we welcome regulation that might slow down or prevent a competitor from unseating us."

That's exactly what this is. GDPR is untenable and creates magical rights where none exist. You don't own information about you. Data is data. The only reasonable thing I can see out of it is getting companies to clarify (simplify) their EULAs.

GDPR is happening because silicon valley and the adtech industry have been taking the absolute piss for years and Europe is fed up.

Re: USA needs law 'a lot like GDPR' says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

#48

Post by Quenty »

kinsomo wrote: post #35
epicmellon wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly what this is. GDPR is untenable and creates magical rights where none exist. You don't own information about you. Data is data. The only reasonable thing I can see out of it is getting companies to clarify (simplify) their EULAs.

> GDPR...creates magical rights where none exist. You don't own information about you. Data is data. You could literally say that about any property right ever. For instance: common law creates magical rights where none exist. You don't own your toothbrush. Matter is matter. The law can create rights. That's how most rights are created.

Patents are a great example of this, where we artificially limit an idea, creating an artificial monopoly for 20 years to incentivize inventions and to encourage people to share their ideas so progress is not lost.

Re: USA needs law 'a lot like GDPR' says Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff

#50

Post by bhaak »

Karunamon wrote: post #20
epicmellon wrote: post #15

Can we just take a step back and admit that treating an IP address as personal information is patently ridiculous?

Doubly so when legal precedent exists that IP isn’t sufficient enough to identify a person.

There's also legal precedent that IPs can be sufficient enough to identify a person.
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