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Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

aje.io

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Re: Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

#81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Knowing people in other countries is a tiny minority? Absolutely yes. Especially across two continents. Europeans who have friends from Europe would all be in Europe anyway. Europe is larger than US btw, it has two times the population. Russia+Turkey+Germany alone account for 95% of the population of the United States.

I would assume that most Europeans know people living on another continent, or at least people who have lived there in the recent past. There are plenty of careers and hobbies where you make international connections, plenty of jobs that require you to live somewhere else for a while, and plenty of people looking for opportunities elsewhere. Globally, around 1 person in 30 lives outside their country of origin, so kn…

> I would assume that most Europeans know people living on another continent

Not most, just some.

1 out of 30 is a bit more than 3% and many of those have family connections, they are not strangers living abroad, they are - for example - Italians living in Canada.

EU citizens whose data should be kept in EU.

Re: Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

#82

I can’t see why it would be devastating in practice. Why can’t the servers that deduce every little thing about the users be also based in EU? If I want a worldwide ad (is that even a thing?) for left-leaning horse owners between ages of 20-27.5 with a child and at least 2 partners, can’t that be dished out from an EU server for EU users?

I, an American, have a friend in France, where is our friendship stored? I send a message to my friend in France they send me one back, where are these two messages stored? We have a photo taken while traveling together in Belgium with 2 other Americans, what server? I could see this being a problem only effectively solved by a separate EU and US Facebook. It is not clear what data they are worried about transmission…

[deleted]

Re: Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

#83
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference is that, as an E.U citizen, the governments and agencies that might access this data, along with the laws that allow for that access, are ultimately accountable to me and my fellow citizens. If my data is transferred to the U.S, I have no ability to influence how it's used at all, I effectively have no rights.

I’m an average random person. I have zero, even being high paranoia, of some other country surveilling me. But my own country “spying” and surveilling me can be scary. They have a lot of power over me. My one voice isn’t important enough to change any legislation or actions. I doubt yours is either. If something unlucky happens with the surveillance of you in your country, you’re likely out of luck. OTOH, nothing hap…

> I have zero, even being high paranoia, of some other country surveilling me

Right until the point of some weird twist in geopolitics and oops, that other country is sharing all it had on you with your home country.

It's like Microsoft buying Skype or Facebook buying WhatsApp, but you can't opt out and delete your account.

Re: Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

#84
post #79

I know that a lot of people's reaction to this might be, "screw Facebook", but the ramification might be "entrench Facebook such that no one can compete with them." If the Irish data regulator enforces the provisional order, it would effectively end the privileged access companies in the US have to personal data from Europe and put them on the same footing as companies in other nations outside the bloc. This isn't ju…

It was quite easy, in my software, to have a settings with “data storage location” EU/US/Asia, and we transfer the data over to the country of their choice, with a little downtime. Granted there is a main database with everyone’s key/auth/chosen database, but that’s the only centralized data.

Re: Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

#85

I can’t see why it would be devastating in practice. Why can’t the servers that deduce every little thing about the users be also based in EU? If I want a worldwide ad (is that even a thing?) for left-leaning horse owners between ages of 20-27.5 with a child and at least 2 partners, can’t that be dished out from an EU server for EU users?

I, an American, have a friend in France, where is our friendship stored? I send a message to my friend in France they send me one back, where are these two messages stored? We have a photo taken while traveling together in Belgium with 2 other Americans, what server? I could see this being a problem only effectively solved by a separate EU and US Facebook. It is not clear what data they are worried about transmission…

That's an interesting challenge.

Social connections span legal jurisdictions.

Re: Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

#86
post #70
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both, unless your "friend" does not consider you as a friend, in that case it is only in yours.

People who live in society have learnt how to see themselves, in mirrors, as they appear to their friends. I have no friends: is that why my flesh is so naked? https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/548471-people-who-live-in-s... Let us consider your hypothetical glitched friend-state within Antoine’s concept of distributed self awareness. Does the friend delusion lead to self delusion or vice versa?

I may not consider someone a friend, but still know they do. Imagine the case of people that make "friends" to abuse them or steal information. Note that it doesnt stop them from feeling the friendship is fake and faking that themselves. You see patterns like that in spy stories with double or triple agents. Not sure how many recursions a human brain is able to handle on an everyday basis, I would guess between 2 and 4?

Re: Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

#87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I, an American, have a friend in France, where is our friendship stored? I send a message to my friend in France they send me one back, where are these two messages stored? We have a photo taken while traveling together in Belgium with 2 other Americans, what server? I could see this being a problem only effectively solved by a separate EU and US Facebook. It is not clear what data they are worried about transmission…

An "easy" solution would be for FB to lobby for the USA to adopt privacy laws similar to those in Europe. Then maybe the data transfer ban could be lifted (somehow I suspect that will not be the case)

[deleted]

Re: Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

#88
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I suspect cases like this are a tiny minority. Knowing people in other countries is a tiny minority? Maybe in the US, given its size, but it's pretty widespread and normal in Europe.

> Knowing people in other countries is a tiny minority? Absolutely yes. Especially across two continents. Europeans who have friends from Europe would all be in Europe anyway. Europe is larger than US btw, it has two times the population. Russia+Turkey+Germany alone account for 95% of the population of the United States.

Russia and Turkey have something like GDPR minus a few clauses plus national scope instead of EU scope. Data portability agreements between those would be pretty straightforward.

Re: Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

#89
post #58
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comment is very biased, who are you to speak for all facebook users? For one thing, Facebook allows me to stay connected with my family in another country. I'm infinity grateful to it for that, and I'm ready to exchange getting this amazing free service for my very personal information. No one stole this data from me, I'm happy with this arrangement. Same with other the services: Google's, amazon, and what not..…

They do not compete with each other (potential competitors just get bought out), and already do lobbying in vast quantities. And there's nothing about inter-country communication which requires Facebook's data mining, inasmuch as there are already network links between them which Facebook uses.

I’d view “buying competitors” as a sign of “competing”.

Otherwise, in the Middle Ages, “European kingdoms don’t fight wars, they just conquer one another”

Re: Facebook faces ‘devastating’ EU-to-US data transfer ban

#90
post #79

I know that a lot of people's reaction to this might be, "screw Facebook", but the ramification might be "entrench Facebook such that no one can compete with them." If the Irish data regulator enforces the provisional order, it would effectively end the privileged access companies in the US have to personal data from Europe and put them on the same footing as companies in other nations outside the bloc. This isn't ju…

> team of 2-4

It seems you'd have loads of other hurdles to get over before intl-data becomes the thing that would block your growth.

My 4 person team solves with country specific domains and hosting.

Before that we had to figure out how to be profitable and "default alive" which was orders of magnitude harder than data silos.

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