Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

351–360 of 450 posts

Re: Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case

#351

Post by smsm42 »

danShumway wrote: post #94

This is kind of a trend I've been noticing, where Europe will try to fix a valid technological problem, but pick the most problematic or poorly implemented solution to do it. It's not clear to me what the difference is between a government censoring someone directly and a government making it impossible for anyone to find a piece of information. Right to Be Forgotten only works if it becomes prohibitively expensive f…

Where's a valid technological problem? I see the problem being that there's true information out there that is unpleasant to somebody, and that somebody wants to force others to not be able to access that information. It's not a technological problem. It may be a societal problem (e.g. we are supposed to forgive and forget, but instead we obsess over a mistake somebody made 30 years ago) but I don't see how it is a technological problem.

> solved more elegantly by creating anti-discrimination laws around criminal records

Such laws have a terrible record. What happens in reality is not that company says "screw it, we'll take a risk of hiring a criminal since we can't run a background check" but "we'll use next available statistical heuristic for being a criminal and if you have it we won't let you nowhere around 90% - we'd fail you much earlier and we'd build the process in a way that you can prove nothing". And if you're familiar with statistical heuristics they'd use - and note they're not trained statistician so they wouldn't go into such details as "bad sign for the whole population but good sign for this particular tiny subgroup", especially if they hire for a position where they have a large pool of candidates - you can imagine how discriminatory it would be in practice.

Re: Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case

#352

Post by smsm42 »

equalunique wrote: post #284
quanticle wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not clear to me why this problem couldn't be solved more elegantly by creating anti-discrimination laws around criminal records. Because anti-discrimination laws around criminal records will work about as well as anti-discrimination laws regarding all the other protected classes (race, gender, age, etc.). Companies will very quickly figure out how to work around them, and will find ways to reject candidates for…

>What will probably happen is that companies will move the background check step ahead of the interview step. The cost of doing interviews to screen candidates is much lower than background checks. Why would a company want to do that step first?

To remove the risk of potential lawsuit of course.

Re: Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case

#353

Post by quanticle »

equalunique wrote: post #284
quanticle wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not clear to me why this problem couldn't be solved more elegantly by creating anti-discrimination laws around criminal records. Because anti-discrimination laws around criminal records will work about as well as anti-discrimination laws regarding all the other protected classes (race, gender, age, etc.). Companies will very quickly figure out how to work around them, and will find ways to reject candidates for…

>What will probably happen is that companies will move the background check step ahead of the interview step. The cost of doing interviews to screen candidates is much lower than background checks. Why would a company want to do that step first?

>The cost of doing interviews to screen candidates is much lower than background checks.

I highly doubt that. An engineer-hour costs roughly $100. A background check probably costs roughly as much as a phone screen, and an order of a magnitude less than an on-site. It'd be pretty easy to do the background check step in between the phone screen and the on-site, and it wouldn't appreciably raise costs to the company.

Re: Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case

#354

Post by smsm42 »

danShumway wrote: post #318
tripzilch wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I dunno, Europeans must trust their courts a lot more than I trust mine. Well, there are some fundamental differences in how we do law in the EU, compared to the US. We don't do the "jury of peers" thing (and I'm still not sure if this if really true or just stories/TV but, aren't juries specifically selected to have no background in the case matter, or legal matter?). Further, it's not unheard of that the judges a…

> And in addition to that, the "if the law is in fact on your side"-part is also easier to determine beforehand I do think that American courts have a problem with this, and I do wish Americans cared more about it. It's fairly standard to hear people over here talk about whether or not something is legal and say "Oh, but I'm not a lawyer, make sure you consult with one before making any decisions." That always irrita…

> Our laws ostensibly exist for the common people

That's how US Constitution was written (not that it helped a lot - there's still hot debate about what "abridging the freedom of speech" or "to keep and bear arms" means). But most of the other laws are about as readable to the common man as a patch against dense APL code is readable to a seven year old. You may encounter some words you think you recognize. And then there are bylaws and regulations, which most people don't even know exist and some are impossible to get without paying money (yes, really). And then in common law system there's caselaw which is court decision having the power of law. Common man has the chance of a snowball in a nuclear reactor.

Re: Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case

#355

Post by jimmywanger »

tomkarlo wrote: post #323
equalunique wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What will probably happen is that companies will move the background check step ahead of the interview step. The cost of doing interviews to screen candidates is much lower than background checks. Why would a company want to do that step first?

How much does an outsourced background check? Running an interview pool on someone using a bunch of skilled employees costs probably $4K or so. Figure 7 interviews, 3 hrs each (prep, interview, feedback, hiring meeting) plus someone to arrange the onsite. If those are $150K employees, the fully-loaded cost of 20 hrs of work is going to be over $4K.

Google, Facebook, and LinkedIn all have roughly the same interview process. One hour phone screen, 5 hour on-site interviews, then a decision.

I have never encountered a situation with 7 interviews.

Bear in mind that many wash out during the phone screen, so no, a fully loaded interview schedule is not that sort of commitment at all.

Re: Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case

#356

Post by petre »

mattsfrey wrote: post #349
danShumway wrote: post #94

This is kind of a trend I've been noticing, where Europe will try to fix a valid technological problem, but pick the most problematic or poorly implemented solution to do it. It's not clear to me what the difference is between a government censoring someone directly and a government making it impossible for anyone to find a piece of information. Right to Be Forgotten only works if it becomes prohibitively expensive f…

The problem with this is they ask you up front on your application for most jobs whether you have been convicted of a crime. If the answer is yes, generally your application is thrown in the trash. If you lie and they catch you, they have grounds to reject you.

If you were to game this system you'd have incentive to lie, just in case they don't catch you. Companies could just ask candidates for the criminal record. This is actually common practice in Europe.

Former cons should be able to get a job, otherwise they'll just end up in jail again. If it's white collar crime then they could be just temporarily barred from that profession as part of the sentence.

Re: Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case

#357

Post by petre »

eadmund wrote: post #335
jacquesm wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except of course that is not how it works. Almost every country has a way for companies who have a legitimate need to query the government for a 'clean past' on citizens. That you can't get that question answered through Google is actually good. Just think about it: anybody can add content to Google, and making you look bad is as simple as making a page with a bunch of stuff about you that isn't actually true. And in…

> Almost every country has a way for companies who have a legitimate need to query the government for a 'clean past' on citizens. Seems to me that's an opportunity for regulatory capture: politically-connected companies end up permitted to check on potential employees, while upstarts and outcasts don't — giving an unfair advantage (assuming the hiring criminals is a disadvantage) to the well-connected firms.

The only ones with legal access to your criminal record are law enforcement, courts and yourself. Minor crimes are also erased off what is handed out to you after a while. Companies can just ask you for it as part if the job application.

Re: Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case

#358

Post by hahainternet »

jasode wrote: post #286
hahainternet wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> why do they have a sex offender registry? We have a Violent and Sex Offender Register: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violent_and_Sex_Offender_Regis... It is not public, it exists to facilitate Police intelligence.

>It is not public, it exists to facilitate Police intelligence. The "police intelligence" gives a misleading impression. Non-police residents can inquire about felons on the list because of Sarah's Law.[1] In other words... "If I molested a child and served my 10 year prison sentence, I'm not truly _forgiven_ if people can check if I'm on a sex offender registry." Therefore, don't use "forgive" as the framework. It s…

It's clear you're not looking at this from a neutral perspective. Given that the situation is significantly different than you imagined and your view has not changed.

> Many defendents refuse a plea bargain of "guilty" because they don't want to be put on that list.

This is not the US.

> Non-police residents can inquire about felons on the list because of Sarah's Law

This is no different than an extended check which any company allowing you to work with children can carry out. The difference is here that vulnerable new partners of the person can enquire if they see fit.

It is about keeping people safe, not punishing people. It's literally a criminal offence to reveal information about someone having to sign the register.

Re: Google loses ‘right to be forgotten’ case

#359

Post by lotu »

quanticle wrote: post #353
equalunique wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What will probably happen is that companies will move the background check step ahead of the interview step. The cost of doing interviews to screen candidates is much lower than background checks. Why would a company want to do that step first?

>The cost of doing interviews to screen candidates is much lower than background checks. I highly doubt that. An engineer-hour costs roughly $100. A background check probably costs roughly as much as a phone screen, and an order of a magnitude less than an on-site. It'd be pretty easy to do the background check step in between the phone screen and the on-site, and it wouldn't appreciably raise costs to the company.

Most interviewers aren’t engineers, in tech sure, but their are lots of other industries
Post reply on HN