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TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

reuters.com

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Re: TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

#81

Post by calvinmorrison »

reaperducer wrote: post #39
calvinmorrison wrote: post #7

I have always promised myself that if I become a billionare, I will simply stop providing services to municipalities or countries that create arbitrary laws that make it hard or difficult to do business in. Honestly Google should have just boycotted Europe for a week and seen how well everyone handles not having gmail, google, or anything. California is particularly onerous about all sorts of stuff like labelling eve…

I have always promised myself that if I become a billionare, I will simply stop providing services to municipalities or countries that create arbitrary laws that make it hard or difficult to do business in. So you've decided to limit yourself to not doing business on planet Earth, or becoming a Bond villain. Interesting choice.

A giant submarine lair would be rather cool, I suppose.

Turns out the real 'Bond Villians' in our world prefer to get stuff done through legal and boring channels like market manipulation (MSFT), breaking the law and using their lawyers to do so (uber), to pay off politicians through lobbying (what would not it in this parenthesis).

Re: TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

#82

Post by slavak »

XCSme wrote: post #29
retSava wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, it is better, since I assume that you don't click "yes, allow". If you would, you would likely have a cookie saying "he/she is ours" with a lifetime longer than the heatdeath of the universe. If you dare to click no, that's when you get 10k options and optouts and have to send fax to someones grandma. The root cause of your experience being worse is not the legislation, it's that the site doesn't follow the int…

> They could simply present you with a yes/no modal once and be done with it Any extra modal, as simple as it might be, leads to a really bad user experience and wasted time.

Then don't place cookies that aren't necessary for the delivery of your service. There, problem solved!

If invading your users' privacy is more important than your site's user experience, then the blame is on you, not the legislation.

Re: TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

#83

Post by pjc50 »

djohnston wrote: post #9

As I click my 10,000th cookie modal to read this article, I am forced to ask if this legislation has made my web experience better in any way, to which the answer is a resounding no. I understand the importance of it, but please prioritise revising its shortcomings rather than doubling down on being the most tech-hostile region in the developed world.

"Privacy conscious" need not be "tech hostile".

Personally I feel the problem arose from trying to write extremely generalist legislation in the GDPR without actually addressing the economic incentives OR mandating a technical solution.

Mandating a technical solution such as "respect the DNT header" would have the disadvantage of limiting innovation, but would have forced a clear division of websites into "you can't browse here without turning DNT off" and ones that actually worked properly.

Alternatively, just straight up banning the browser-targeted advertising practice would take away the economic incentive to do this kind of nonsense. That would force the "how do we get paid" question again, which remains awkward.

Re: TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

#84

Post by dmitriid »

bzb6 wrote: post #76
piva00 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the legislators didn't want the pop-ups to be annoying. They didn't even require pop-ups. Who wants the pop-ups to be annoying and riddled with dark patterns are the ones implementing it, exactly to cause this kind of reaction on you so you start hating the law, not the ones who are trying their best to skirt around it, to find the loopholes and abuse them. To make your experience as poor as possible while being…

I know the law and how bloody stupid it is. Third party cookies and ad blockers are configurable in your browser, if you don’t configure them then it’s your fault.

> I know the law and how bloody stupid it is.

If you knew the law, you wouldn't say it was stupid

> Third party cookies and ad blockers are configurable in your browser, if you don’t configure them then it’s your fault.

Ah, the victim-blaming begins. No, it's not my fault that ad companies willy-nilly collect any and all information and sell it to the highest bidder.

Re: TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

#85

Post by stingraycharles »

tjoff wrote: post #17
djohnston wrote: post #9

As I click my 10,000th cookie modal to read this article, I am forced to ask if this legislation has made my web experience better in any way, to which the answer is a resounding no. I understand the importance of it, but please prioritise revising its shortcomings rather than doubling down on being the most tech-hostile region in the developed world.

As clear as can be yes. Now you know which websites are willing to absolutely ruin your experience just to abuse you. The implications can be seen pretty much everywhere in society, it is a momentous step in the right direction.

But the worst offenders just have a simple “we use cookies” banner; the ones that give you the most choice are often more intrusive.

Re: TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

#86

Post by trulyme »

leesalminen wrote: post #79
hrktb wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they don't know any better There is a ton of literature about how it should be done, there has been enough press for anyone to be aware that it's a serious subject that needs to be studied, and small companies will often consult with external legal advisors because they can't afford to get on the wrong side of the law on this aspect. I've participated to a ton of these discussions in small and big entities, basical…

> because they can't afford to get on the wrong side of the law on this aspect. Conversely, some can't afford to get on the right side of the law on this aspect. In our case, we had ~15 customers in the EU (out of ~2000), totaling $2,000/mo MRR. After talking with our legal counsel, we decided to exit the EU market entirely. Our business model was a simple niche B2B SaaS. We never sold, shared, or traded any data of…

Cool! Care to share the niche?

P.S.: no opportunity is lost. There is always someone else who seizes it. :)

Re: TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

#87

Post by lrem »

yholio wrote: post #53
tushar-r wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am forced to ask if this legislation has made my web experience better in any way, to which the answer is a resounding no. I actually find myself digging into the settings that are offered to click on "Reject All" where possible. I wish my region had the same data protections :-/

Reject third party cookies coupled with session only cookies works pretty well though.

Where's the "reject server-side fingerprinting"?

Re: TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

#88

Post by vincnetas »

bzb6 wrote: post #76
piva00 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the legislators didn't want the pop-ups to be annoying. They didn't even require pop-ups. Who wants the pop-ups to be annoying and riddled with dark patterns are the ones implementing it, exactly to cause this kind of reaction on you so you start hating the law, not the ones who are trying their best to skirt around it, to find the loopholes and abuse them. To make your experience as poor as possible while being…

I know the law and how bloody stupid it is. Third party cookies and ad blockers are configurable in your browser, if you don’t configure them then it’s your fault.

This sounds like victim blaming to me.

Re: TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

#89

Post by jamaicahest »

djohnston wrote: post #9

As I click my 10,000th cookie modal to read this article, I am forced to ask if this legislation has made my web experience better in any way, to which the answer is a resounding no. I understand the importance of it, but please prioritise revising its shortcomings rather than doubling down on being the most tech-hostile region in the developed world.

How is this relevant to the article?

Re: TikTok hit with consumer law breaches complaints across Europe

#90

Post by dmitriid »

ineedasername wrote: post #73
Nextgrid wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem isn't the legislation but its lack of enforcement. The legislation itself explicitly prohibits annoying/misleading consent prompts.

Having to go through a menu of a few dozen items to see & choose what you'll allow to track you is annoying, but so long as sites are willing to track you in dozens of different ways there's really no way around it. Sites win because exercising your privacy rights even under the GDPR is an inherently annoying thing to do.

> Sites win because exercising your privacy rights even under the GDPR is an inherently annoying thing to do.

Under GDPR:

- only cookies and data strictly required for the site's functionality don't require consent

- collection of any other data requires consent

- pre-ticked boxes, lack of "reject all" button, leading the user to click "allow all" and similar dark patterns are not consent, and are, strictly speaking, violating the law.

See? exercising your privacy rights under the GDPR should be extremely easy. Too bad the law isn't enforced vigorously enough.

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