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Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with €530M fine over data transfers to China

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Re: Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with €530M fine over data transfers to China

#51

Post by diggan »

feverzsj wrote: post #31
lukan wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I rather think they don't need to request, but have a direct line into the servers.

China government literally forces direct integration into every messaging and financial service. If you talk shit about the government in wechat, the police will call you the next minute.

Fun fact: This is also why iCloud in China isn't actually run by Apple at all, but by a company called AIPO Cloud (Guizhou) Technology Co. Ltd, and the Terms of Service/Privacy Policy is different from the rest of iCloud.

Re: Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with €530M fine over data transfers to China

#52

Post by tossandthrow »

aurareturn wrote: post #45
SilverBirch wrote: post #40

Two things I wonder about: first are these fines actually going to happen or is the sort of thing where it gets appealed indefinitely. And second, where do the fines go? It sounds a lot like since Ireland is where Tiktok is getting fined the fines go to the Irish government which would seem crazy. The fines are assessed in the context of the full EU, but only Ireland gets the revenue? This is broken.

If it's truly Ireland only, then Tiktok might just exit the country and not pay the fine. Perhaps this is what Ireland wants? Ireland is a small market. It'll take forever to make 530m in profit in Ireland for Tiktok.

TikTok has their EU office in Ireland, that is why the case is happening there.

The verdict is for the entire EU, they'd have to exit the EU market.

Re: Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with €530M fine over data transfers to China

#55

Post by pjc50 »

SilverBirch wrote: post #40

Two things I wonder about: first are these fines actually going to happen or is the sort of thing where it gets appealed indefinitely. And second, where do the fines go? It sounds a lot like since Ireland is where Tiktok is getting fined the fines go to the Irish government which would seem crazy. The fines are assessed in the context of the full EU, but only Ireland gets the revenue? This is broken.

UK: the regulator which issues the fine pays almost all of it (minus some expense recovery) into the consolidated fund, i.e. the same pot as taxes.

This is roughly what I'd expect. The EU does very little law enforcement directly, most is done through national regulators.

This is the reverse of the Apple situation, where the EU fined the Irish government for not collecting enough taxes from Apple.

Re: Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with €530M fine over data transfers to China

#56

Post by cynicalsecurity »

Not enough. A fine is just a price for people's private data. Companies should never be allowed to transfer private data of citizens to authoritarian countries and should be de-registered and banned from accessing the free world in such case.

Re: Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with €530M fine over data transfers to China

#57

Post by lolinder »

prof-dr-ir wrote: post #7

'massive' -- by which standards? It is high time we got used to companies being fined a reasonable fraction of their revenue. And TikTok's global revenue last year alone was estimated at $20 billion to $26 billion [1]. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/17/technology/tiktok-ban-byt...

To hurt enough to be worth changing the fines don't have to be a fraction of their global revenue, they have to be significantly more than the benefit gained from the illegal behavior. According to that article TikTok made $10B of that $20B in the US alone, which puts a cap on their European revenue of $10B (likely significantly less because this ignores Brazil and Indonesia, which according to the linked article are its largest markets by user count).

€530m is ~$600m, so this fine is at least 6% of their relevant 2024 revenue, and likely substantially higher. I don't know enough about their business practices to know if that's a big enough chunk to make up for what they gain by cheating, but it's definitely not a wrist slap.

Re: Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with €530M fine over data transfers to China

#59

Post by kubb »

aurareturn wrote: post #29
graemep wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? A nice rational genocide or two? China is an expansionist dictatorship. It would be ridiculous to suggest it is more trustworthy than the US. The US is actually acting rationally IMO. People just look at headlines and do not dig into the reasons. You might not agree with the reasoning, but it is not irrational. For example the tariffs clearly follow from arguments made by Trump's appointees (such as Bessent a…

Really? A nice rational genocide or two? Huh? So China dealing with an internal extremist Islam problem is a genocide? But the US funding/providing weapons to Israel in the Gaza war is not a genocide? China is an expansionist dictatorship. It would be ridiculous to suggest it is more trustworthy than the US. The US has bombed 29 countries since WW2. How many has China bombed? The US has installed dictators in foreign…

You’re getting downvoted, but the US foreign policy is more hawkish than China’s by any measure.

Internally I’m inclined to believe that it can be hell on earth for minorities.

Re: Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with €530M fine over data transfers to China

#60

Post by _Algernon_ »

kubb wrote: post #59
aurareturn wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? A nice rational genocide or two? Huh? So China dealing with an internal extremist Islam problem is a genocide? But the US funding/providing weapons to Israel in the Gaza war is not a genocide? China is an expansionist dictatorship. It would be ridiculous to suggest it is more trustworthy than the US. The US has bombed 29 countries since WW2. How many has China bombed? The US has installed dictators in foreign…

You’re getting downvoted, but the US foreign policy is more hawkish than China’s by any measure. Internally I’m inclined to believe that it can be hell on earth for minorities.

They are getting downvoted because they are arguing against a straw man.

>But the US funding/providing weapons to Israel in the Gaza war is not a genocide?

Nowhere did the comment they replied to claim that the war in Gaza isn't a genocide.

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