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Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

lawandcrime.com

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Re: Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

#61

Post by grecy »

crazygringo wrote: post #41
droffel wrote: post #4

In the absense of capital punishment for corporations, fines can and will be seen as merely the cost of doing business. It feels like the only way to address this is by holding the decision makers (executives) responsible, but that would require piercing the corporate veil[1], which has disappointingly low precedent in the US [1]Edit: piercing the veil refers to holding shareholders responsible, which is a different…

> fines can and will be seen as merely the cost of doing business There's nothing inherently wrong with that. The answer, of course, is that fines can be increased to the point where businesses change. Just recently, Amazon was forced to completely shut down in France because the level of fines made it impossible to run their business at all. Businesses respond to incentives. Fines are an incentive. They can be set a…

> It's the responsibility of government to figure out the right level.

Which is simply impossible when companies openly pay legislators millions of dollars not to.

Re: Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

#62

Post by perl4ever »

twomoretime wrote: post #44
perl4ever wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Why don't we" Way too many people ask "why don't we" before figuring out what they are talking about. Arthur Andersen got the death penalty. If you point that out, people will argue with you, no the death penalty would be something different. It doesn't matter what you think a word or phrase means, you should have a good idea of what you mean by it before advocating it.

What? I'm identifying a need and a possible solution. Now we have a civil discussion with the goal of exchanging information.

Sorry if I sounded hostile, but I'm saying that when you use a phrase and assume everyone knows what it means just because everybody uses it, that's not identifying a solution and it's not a starting point for a discussion.

I'd love to have a discussion about the corporate death penalty, as long as it's based on some concrete idea of what it is and why it should help.

It's a topic that comes up over and over and I wouldn't even comment if I wasn't interested in something substantive and different from the norm.

Re: Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

#63

Post by stevespang »

$5 billion is $5 billion less that Zuckerberg will have to put up more NO TRESPASSING SIGNS on what his fantasizes is his Hawaii beachfront and to hire guys in black suits with Raybans and earbuds to police what is by State law a PUBLIC beachfront.

Re: Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

#64

Post by noad »

tsimionescu wrote: post #37

It's interesting that the site presenting this story has, by their own declaration, 382 different marketing-related cookies, which you are required to accept with no alternatives if you want to browse the site. I'm not trying to say that they are not entitled to report on FB's privacy violations or something, they are reporters and it is very good that they are doing so. It's just amazing to what extent journalism si…

It's not journalism, it's the web. Every protocol and layer in the stack has been subverted to the will of advertisers and trackers. The whole platform is a total nightmare. The standards bodies were completely subverted by corporations, most notably the W3C.

When I try to explain to young people that I spent years browsing the web before there was any advertising at all on it they often don't believe me.

Re: Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

#65

Post by kelnos »

notechback wrote: post #45
mattmanser wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason you don't have crazy nonsense like this is that it would be a field-day for political persecution. Prefect for corruption. A politician with clout doesn't like what some CEO said, or that he bankrolled your opponent? Destroy their business by setting the prosecutors on them, jail their CEO, destroy their business by seizing the cashflow, and then 2 years down the line, charges dropped. Whoops.

Well this is why the judiciary should be independent, not political as in the US

The executive is responsible for prosecuting cases, not the judiciary.

Re: Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

#66

Post by mgraczyk »

elliekelly wrote: post #25
tsherr wrote: post #6

If you want corporations like Facebook to care about breaking the law, you need start handing out jail time for the CEOs. Fining a significant percentage of revenue might work, but they'd probably cook the books.

Why jail time? Hit them where it hurts: their company stock. Corporate malfeasance should (in part) be punished by clawing back some portion of executive stock compensation FBO the victims and/or the government. Some portion of their compensation was “earned” by decisions that violated the law and directly harmed others. Take it away.

Zuckerberg doesn't receive any compensation (besides private security for him and his family)

Re: Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

#67

Post by treebornfrog »

tsimionescu wrote: post #37

It's interesting that the site presenting this story has, by their own declaration, 382 different marketing-related cookies, which you are required to accept with no alternatives if you want to browse the site. I'm not trying to say that they are not entitled to report on FB's privacy violations or something, they are reporters and it is very good that they are doing so. It's just amazing to what extent journalism si…

Most big websites are now in this state.

AdBlock uMatrix etc. Use the tools to remove these.

Life is so much better on the Web without being bombarded by banners.

I've not seen an ad in over 2 and a half years.

Re: Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

#68

Post by josefx »

justapassenger wrote: post #50
antjanus wrote: post #5

it's frustrating. 5 billion for a fine over the course of 8 years of operation? They made $17 billion this quarter .

Made? Revenue is not profit. Their net income was just under $5B this quarter Edit: quarter, not half

Hard to nail any international company on a real number. All that tax dodging[1] makes it hard to know how much they actually make and how much they are moving through shell companies. Better just stick all the executives and stock owners into prison, that is harder to fake.

[1]https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/19/21144291/facebook-irs-law...

Re: Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

#69

Post by jazzyjackson »

josefx wrote: post #68
justapassenger wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Made? Revenue is not profit. Their net income was just under $5B this quarter Edit: quarter, not half

Hard to nail any international company on a real number. All that tax dodging[1] makes it hard to know how much they actually make and how much they are moving through shell companies. Better just stick all the executives and stock owners into prison, that is harder to fake. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/19/21144291/facebook-irs-law...

Now that you mention it, wouldn't click fraud be an excellent money laundering environment? All these bullshit content farms (taboola, outbrain, etc) that provide no value to the people actually using the web -- it's just a paycheck to publishers, where is the value coming from?

People are buying and selling click traffic (likes, follows, youtube views), suppose you just buy advertising and it gets placed on domains all over the web -- if I want to transfer money to you, you just need to spin up a domain, get taboola recommending some gut health articles, and I can buy ad placements and point my botnet at your domain, clicking on the ads I paid for so you get all the kickbacks -- something like that I'm not in the ad brokering business myself! Or the money laundering business for that matter :)

Re: Judge approves Facebook's settlement with FTC over ‘stunning’ privacy violations

#70

Post by justinclift »

> In other words, this had better be the end of Facebook’s shenanigans, or the FTC won’t be the only one to drop the hammer.

Pretty much no-one expects this to be the end of Facebook's "shenanigans".

So, what's suitable for the next go around?

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