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French watchdog fines Google, Amazon for breaching cookies rules

fr.reuters.com

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Re: French watchdog fines Google, Amazon for breaching cookies rules

#81

Post by swiley »

pestaa wrote: post #34

Everybody is so focused on 'cookies' as if the technology itself was regulated. The web developers (or marketing agencies or whatever) are also slow to learn what proper data protection means, and slap popups and banners on everything, making the web disgusting and regulations seem misguided. A session cookie, especially after a login, may not require consent at all. Describe in your policy what personal data, if any…

Session cookies for handling a login make sense. Session cookies on static pages are a violation of people's privacy.

Re: French watchdog fines Google, Amazon for breaching cookies rules

#82

Post by bzb6 »

M2Ys4U wrote: post #29
aquadrop wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better than cookies popups, at least it didn't create huge annoying thing.

The cookie banners being annoying is because these companies want it to be annoying so you don't pay attention and just click accept without actually learning what they do with your data.

So they are not only annoying but also worthless. Got it.

Re: French watchdog fines Google, Amazon for breaching cookies rules

#84

Post by quantumwannabe »

Zenst wrote: post #22

I can't help but feel that fines by countries of big corps is just so routine that it's probably part of the budget. Sure we see fines, but what happens to the money from the fines! Do they go to the users impacted - nope. Do changes happen as a result - slowly if at all. It's all kinda like some form of taxation upon the user/people as we all know any large fine upon a corporation - who ends up paying for it...the u…

It literally is. Check out Google’s quarterly earnings reports, they have a line item for “European Commission fines” under “Accrued expenses and other current liabilities”.

[1] https://abc.xyz/investor/static/pdf/20201030_alphabet_10Q.pd...

Re: French watchdog fines Google, Amazon for breaching cookies rules

#85

Post by Iv »

Zenst wrote: post #22

I can't help but feel that fines by countries of big corps is just so routine that it's probably part of the budget. Sure we see fines, but what happens to the money from the fines! Do they go to the users impacted - nope. Do changes happen as a result - slowly if at all. It's all kinda like some form of taxation upon the user/people as we all know any large fine upon a corporation - who ends up paying for it...the u…

That's how it works and it works well: let's be fair, the law is not always 100% clear. Some companies try to find the line, have the budget for it, and find it when they get slapped. The goal is not to kill the infringing company, it is to force them to adapt their business models.

In France, as we see here in the difference in fines between Amazon and Google, the fines are not a flat rate: repeated offenses lead to harsher sentences.

Re: French watchdog fines Google, Amazon for breaching cookies rules

#86

Post by [deleted] »

Zenst wrote: post #22

I can't help but feel that fines by countries of big corps is just so routine that it's probably part of the budget. Sure we see fines, but what happens to the money from the fines! Do they go to the users impacted - nope. Do changes happen as a result - slowly if at all. It's all kinda like some form of taxation upon the user/people as we all know any large fine upon a corporation - who ends up paying for it...the u…

[deleted]

Re: French watchdog fines Google, Amazon for breaching cookies rules

#87

Post by BlueTemplar »

tusharsoni wrote: post #49
thepangolino wrote: post #45

I never understood why that EU regulation wasn't required at the browser level in the first place.

Because not all cookies are regulated (such as session cookies). It would be hard for browser to tell what the cookie is for.

Still, why isn't there a Web standard for this?

Re: French watchdog fines Google, Amazon for breaching cookies rules

#88

Post by zinekeller »

ape4 wrote: post #76

Do these laws apply to browser local storage and all other ways to save info? And once a user says "no" to cookies/tracking how is that saved, in a cookie?

As may have pointed out, GDPR does not focus on cookies per se, but Amazon (previously) and Google has put tracking cookies even while declining them. The point is Google is not putting only the "I have opt out" cookie, but putting instead "I have opt out and my ID is 751DBC849846494494A894984" cookie (which is the issue at hand).

Edit: this should be opt-in really, as tracking is explicitly stated as a consensual activity.

Re: French watchdog fines Google, Amazon for breaching cookies rules

#89

Post by zinekeller »

BlueTemplar wrote: post #87
tusharsoni wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because not all cookies are regulated (such as session cookies). It would be hard for browser to tell what the cookie is for.

Still, why isn't there a Web standard for this?

Attempts have been done on this, not once (P3P [1]), not twice (DNT [2]), but multiple times (several expired RFCs, GPC [3]). This sounds like the evil bit (RFC 3514 [4]) at this point.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P3P

2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Do_Not_Track

3: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/10/coming-to-a-brow...

4: https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3514

Re: French watchdog fines Google, Amazon for breaching cookies rules

#90

Post by mikro2nd »

quantumwannabe wrote: post #84
Zenst wrote: post #22

I can't help but feel that fines by countries of big corps is just so routine that it's probably part of the budget. Sure we see fines, but what happens to the money from the fines! Do they go to the users impacted - nope. Do changes happen as a result - slowly if at all. It's all kinda like some form of taxation upon the user/people as we all know any large fine upon a corporation - who ends up paying for it...the u…

It literally is. Check out Google’s quarterly earnings reports, they have a line item for “European Commission fines” under “Accrued expenses and other current liabilities”. [1] https://abc.xyz/investor/static/pdf/20201030_alphabet_10Q.pd...

Reporting an expense in your earnings report is not the same as having it as a line item in your budget.
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