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Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

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Re: Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

#41

Post by onli »

mkuhn wrote: post #34
yanw wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm merely guessing, but seeing how the law takes a backseat when security and anti-terror are involved I suppose that EU governments and the US have reached some sort of agreement about which set of laws to enforce in certain cases.

My guess is that such an "agreement" would have been reached by one side only... The law has been taking much less of a backseat in Europe when it comes to security and anti-terror. Also I find it hard to believe that the EU would just give up its data protection laws just to please Americans and allow the enforcement of an American law.

Which is exactly what the EU did with bank and flightdata. The EU will make a bit of a fight and then simply back down. Like they always do.

Which is possibly preferable for every US-company which thus do not have to challenge your agencies.

Re: Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

#42

Post by wisty »

omh wrote: post #35
wisty wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They could set up special purpose vehicles, with very clear operating rules. That way, if the US asks, Google can say that they have no control over the subsidiary.

If Google US has no control over Google EU then a number of issues could arise. Does Google EU have access to Google US data? What about the code that runs everything? What about profits - why would Google EU send profits back to Google US?

It's tricky, but no trickier than their accounting system ;)

Google EU has a mission to "provide Google US with data hosting, and send profits back to the mothership". They have a contract, in which Google US grants free use of any code data that Google EU needs.

Google EU has a strict constitution, which prevents them from disclosing data, even if Google US wants them to. This clause in their constitution states that it cannot be changed.

If that's too extreme, they could allow the information to be released, but only if cleared by some specific third party.

That's just a rough idea. I'm sure Google's lawyers could come up with something much better.

Re: Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

#43

Post by balpha »

> According to German-language magazine WirtschaftsWoche, a Google spokesperson confirmed that the company has complied with requests from US intelligence agencies for data stored in its European data centers.

This isn't true; the WirtschaftsWoche article doesn't claim this. It says this could happen, but the claim that this article says it already did happen is a lie.

Not that this means it hasn't happened or is unlikely.

Re: Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

#44

Post by Wilya »

mkuhn wrote: post #34
yanw wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm merely guessing, but seeing how the law takes a backseat when security and anti-terror are involved I suppose that EU governments and the US have reached some sort of agreement about which set of laws to enforce in certain cases.

My guess is that such an "agreement" would have been reached by one side only... The law has been taking much less of a backseat in Europe when it comes to security and anti-terror. Also I find it hard to believe that the EU would just give up its data protection laws just to please Americans and allow the enforcement of an American law.

I definitely agree with you on the one sided part..

I'm less concerned by the fact that Google handled the data over US agencies than by the fact that the EU doesn't seem to have made any objections.

Whether it's because the EU doesn't care, or because they was nothing they could possibly do, I don't know. But either way, it doesn't sound right to me.

Re: Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

#45

Post by darklajid »

rjd wrote: post #23
aik wrote: post #5

"Do no evil" -- What do you think? Does this qualify as a breach of their motto? Or is it only a clear message to those who may have thought their Google data is private?

While I'm an open critic of Google I don't think in this case its a breach of that motto. Maybe a failure to disclose obligations to users. Most people would understand the real culprit is the government. Microsoft and Amazon space there data centres geo graphically for a few reasons, and this is one of them.

I think the 'evil' part here is in this case the failure to disclose the fact(s).

The law's evil as well, agreed. The government did evil things passing it, in my world. But that doesn't seem to be the reason for the 'Google did evil' claim here.

Re: Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

#46

Post by darklajid »

balpha wrote: post #43

> According to German-language magazine WirtschaftsWoche, a Google spokesperson confirmed that the company has complied with requests from US intelligence agencies for data stored in its European data centers. This isn't true; the WirtschaftsWoche article doesn't claim this. It says this could happen, but the claim that this article says it already did happen is a lie. Not that this means it hasn't happened or is unl…

From the 'WirtschaftsWoche' article:

Die US-Regierung könne "auf außerhalb der USA gespeicherte Daten zugreifen". Der Konzern habe schon viele solche Abfragen erhalten, schreibt ein Sprecher des Unternehmens.

-- Rough, sorry: --

The US government is able to to access 'data stored outside the USA'. The company already got a large number of these requests, comments a spokesperson of the corporation.

--

Put like this, next to each other, is a strong indicator (yeah, it's still on the edge) that they did, in fact, already comply in the past.

First part is 'would/could/in theory' style, but the following sentence says they got these requests in the past and 'diese' (these) builds a rather strong link to the sentence before.

So - I'm not 100% sure, but let's error on the side of caution: They did it in the past.

Re: Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

#47

Post by davidw »

StrawberryFrog wrote: post #4
yanw wrote: post #3

Corporations based and operating in the US are subject to the PATRIOT Act, it's a shitty law but it's still the law. At least they are transparent about it. Edit: here is the article in question: http://www.wiwo.de/politik-weltwirtschaft/google-server-in-e... They asked if their EU based dataceters are also subject to US warrants and they answered that they are.

"European Union legislation requires companies to protect the personal information of EU citizens" It's the law. What's more, it's a good law. I am concerned that they broke it, and seem to have tried to hide this.

> I am concerned that they broke it, and seem to have tried to hide this.

By, uh, mentioning it to journalists? There's a difference between hiding something and simply not announcing it loudly to the world.

Re: Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

#48

Post by wheels »

nkassis wrote: post #26
ZoFreX wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And corporations based and operating in Europe are subject to our data protection laws. Microsoft and Google (and plenty others) have fully fledged companies in Europe. This raises an interesting question - what should companies do when they are subject to mutually exclusive laws like that? My opinion is that they need to comply with the laws, which might require not having overseas companies in this case. Could they…

It's not about earnings. Having datacenters in europe would still require them to respect the laws in europe. They need those datacenters for latency and plenty of other reasons. If they were forced to only reside in the US or in Europe it would make for a shitty experience for where they are not. And going to europe isn't really feasible when most of the developers they hire come from the US. They could come to Cana…

I wonder if it's a structural problem: if the problem is that the parent incorporation is in the US rather than the US incorporation being a subsidiary of a holding company in e.g. the Cayman Islands. That seems like it'd be a solvable, if massively annoying problem.

Re: Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

#49

Post by iwwr »

iwwr wrote: post #32

It's not as if EU governments have any more qualms about the privacy of their citizens.

The only difference is the greater bureaucratic procedures in handling this data, but there is technically nothing off-limits (information-wise) to law-enforcement or security agencies. This is especially true in the wake of anti-terror legislation all across the EU. This will become more apparent as copyright lobbies are pushing for greater surveillance of internet users.

The old adage that 'if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear' has been thoroughly incorporated into modern state doctrine.

So downvote at will, but it would be nice to do so with some counter-arguments.

Re: Google Admits Handing over European User Data to US Intelligence Agencies

#50

Post by balpha »

darklajid wrote: post #46
balpha wrote: post #43

> According to German-language magazine WirtschaftsWoche, a Google spokesperson confirmed that the company has complied with requests from US intelligence agencies for data stored in its European data centers. This isn't true; the WirtschaftsWoche article doesn't claim this. It says this could happen, but the claim that this article says it already did happen is a lie. Not that this means it hasn't happened or is unl…

From the 'WirtschaftsWoche' article: Die US-Regierung könne "auf außerhalb der USA gespeicherte Daten zugreifen". Der Konzern habe schon viele solche Abfragen erhalten, schreibt ein Sprecher des Unternehmens. -- Rough, sorry: -- The US government is able to to access 'data stored outside the USA'. The company already got a large number of these requests, comments a spokesperson of the corporation. -- Put like this, n…

"outside the USA" != "in Europe"

I assume that WW would have used a much stronger phrasing, had the "Google spokesperson" actually said that. And a Google spokesperson is obviously careful when talking to the press.

Yes, it's not unlikely that they did -- but Softpedia is blatantly misquoting here. They base their writing solely on the WW article, and that one doesn't include anything to back up the claim.

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