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Bulgaria tax hacking: An entire nation was hit
- runeb 7y agoAnyone know how GDPR would handle fining a country? 4% of GNP would be hefty.
- bobthechef 7y agoI do wonder whom that would hurt more to do so. The taxpayer or the kleptocrats in power? Ultimately, we want the right heads to roll and we want it to sting like hell.
- luckylion 7y agoSince Bulgaria's privacy officials would be in charge, any penalty they'd dole out would be paid by the state to the state.
- IAmEveryone 7y agoI know you're just trying to exploit the somewhat widespread cynicism and accusations of hypocriticism for humor, but that just isn't how it works. While fines are routinely used against citizen, companies, and other private entities to force compliance with the law, the absence of fines in the relationship between courts and the executive quite obviously does not imply that the government is free to ignore the law. This should be obvious, considering there are lawsuits against the government in the news every week. Fines are simply not necessary because public servants are duty-bound to follow court orders. In modern democracies, this is not just theory. Ignoring a court's order is virtually unheard of. It would be a major breech of the rule of law, a tenet more central to democracy than even voting. I wouldn't want to see what happens, although the risk has certainly risen in the last, say, two years, at least in the US.
- peshooo 7y ago> In modern democracies, this is not just theory. Ignoring a court's order is virtually unheard of. This might be true for the older/western democracies. Sadly this is not the case in Easter Europe. As we say in Bulgaria - the law is a door in a field. You can go around if you want.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- based2 7y agohttps://www.yahoo.com/news/cyber-expert-charged-huge-bulgarian-163808446.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/cyber-expert-charged-huge-bulgari... The tax agency is facing a fine of up to 20 million euros ($22.5 million) over the breach.
- daurnimator 7y agoWith the fine going where? Probably to general treasury; which the tax office is essentially free to withdraw from.
- buboard 7y agonothing. The state pays itself, it s just 2 records in balance sheets canceling out
- skybrian 7y agoCould the mods add (Bulgaria) to the title?
- dang 7y agoWe've switched to the HTML doc title.
- atdt 7y agoIt is probably too much to hope for that the exfiltrated data includes tax returns for the country's kleptocratic elite. Bulgaria has the worst corruption in the European Union. Seeing just how little tax is paid by the rich could start a movement for change. Then again, it may simply be seen as a sad confirmation of what everybody knows.
- peshooo 7y agoMaybe you are not from Bulgaria. The taxes are pretty low - 10% on pretty much everything - capital gains, on your salary, etc. So there is not much tax evasion. But there are worse issues here, for example: corruption, stealing of European and government funds, oligarchic control of the power, etc.
- mariusmg 7y ago>But there are worse issues here, for example: corruption, stealing of European and government funds, oligarchic control of the power, etc. Ah, the Eastern Europe usual problems...
- ChuckNorris89 7y agoI'm from Eastern Europe and lived in quite a few western European countries and believe me, politicians here are corrupt to the bone as well, just that the people enjoy a higher standard of living and have more disposable income so they're not too bothered by the constant theft going on in the politics high above.
- kartan 7y agoBulgaria underground economy was the highest of the EU27. Is it possible that low/high taxes has no correlation with tax evasion? A good tax office, effective laws and public awareness seems more important than how high or low are taxes. I only found data from 2012: http://jalac.kyxar.fr/ANG/ECONOIR11.html http://jalac.kyxar.fr/ANG/ECONOIR11.html
- 7y ago
- sheeeep86 7y agoI wonder how such a breach will affect pay equality in the country. Theoretically soon everyone could publish how much the different ranks, genders, etc. in each company are making, and give people a nice data to start negotiations from ...
- hiliev 7y agoNegotiating your salary? Where do you live? I take it, not in Bulgaria or in Easter Europe in general.
- seaghost 7y agoThis will happen again and again because governments in developing countries don't understand importance of IT security, where people with no qualifications (often nepotism) works on protecting very important data. Not to mention that someone who is qualified to work there is often working in private sector for 3 to 5 times bigger salary due to govt. regulations on public sector salaries.
- DrJokepu 7y agoDeveloping countries lol. https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/17/politics/customs-and-border-protection-data-breach-license-plates-leaked/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/17/politics/customs-and-border-p...
- seanmcdirmid 7y agoHint: it’s not binary.
- ownagefool 7y agoYeah, the two most common forms of cyber security I've came across are: a) Don't know much, don't care much, don't really do much; or b) Super paranoid that we're going to need really expensive consultants and buy really expensive products, and do lots of manual because automation is insecure, need to be on-prem, basically 10-15 years behind. Neither really patch servers, but often the guys that care are so behind the times they're actually worse.
- domnomnom 7y agoGranted, he said very important data.
- klipt 7y agoIn the US, enough major insurers and credit bureaus have been hacked that I wouldn't be surprised if the majority of US SSNs have already been compromised...
- cheschire 7y agoThis should make it trivial now to see which locals are being paid by foreign military contracts in order to facilitate tradecraft.
- veselin 7y agoMost people in Bulgaria are more concerned that the breach gives new weapons to scammers. There are a handful of groups that scam old people to transfer money pretending to be their relatives in need. There are groups that steal properties or even companies by doing a transfer with fake documents (then the property is resold of course). The finance minister said on the TV these are anyway illegal activities with or without the leaked data. The problem though is that nobody was imprisoned for such crimes for ages, just like there are no politicians going to prison in the last ten years. Guess how many people believe him now.
- ferros 7y agoI submitted this 14 hours ago, same source...? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20490428 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20490428
- dang 7y agoIt's ok for there to be reposts if a story hasn't gotten attention yet. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html
- TazeTSchnitzel 7y agoSweden “solves” this problem by publicising everyone's tax records, along with almost everything else the government knows about them.
- buboard 7y agodoes this include foreign companies? bulgaria is a popular low tax destination for other countries.