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Perhaps Facebook believes that the regulator has stepped beyond its legal authority and would prefer to have a court decide the matter? It's a pretty normal thi

Perhaps Facebook believes that the regulator has stepped beyond its legal authority and would prefer to have a court decide the matter? It's a pretty normal thing. Bureaucrats may be powerful, but, in countries I'm familiar with, they are limited by the law in terms of what actions they may take, what justifications they must provide, and the reach of their decisions' force. Facebook appears to be wagering that this decision will not be enforced, presumably due to an insufficiency of one of these factors. > Unlikely, Facebook will probably back down like they did with Austraila Also, you're mistaken about what happened here. Australia blinked. Facebook got most of what it wanted. Only then did Facebook unban Australian news.

anoncake 5y ago
> Perhaps Facebook believes that the regulator has stepped beyond its legal authority and would prefer to have a court decide the matter? Then they can contest the injunction and if wasn't justified, it will be revoked. But they can't just ignore it.
- asdfasgasdgasdg 5y ago
  Apparently they can just ignore it, though, at the risk of whatever consequences would apply. I confess I do not know the details of the legalities around this particular injunction, whether it behaves like an American injunction, etc. I notice that not a court but a commissioner issued this injunction, and not even a commissioner with authority over all of Germany, but one just within the (state? province? municipality?) of Hamburg. I'm not sure whether that is of any import but it does seem odd to me. Like, if the city of Atlanta had a privacy commission and ordered Facebook not to do something, Facebook would probably just ignore that since cities in the U.S. do not have the power to regulate interstate commerce. I have no idea whether the same type of limitation exists in this case. Presumably Facebook weighed the risks before going ahead. We'll see if their decision turns out to be the right one.
  - fakedang 5y ago
    Just pointing out that Hamburg is a free city republican state within the federal republic of Germany. So I don't think it carries any water.
  - anoncake 5y ago
    Hamburg is a state, and laws are generally executed by the states in Germany. That includes federal and union laws. So that's perfectly normal. I don't know if the the injunction technically applies to all of Germany, but since Facebook doesn't necessarily know if someone is from Hamburg, it probably doesn't matter in practice. In the long run, you can only operate in a jurisdiction in which you are welcome. Especially when your position is unique like Facebook's. A foreign company that openly ignores the law is not and I can only attribute Facebook's behaviour to arrogance.
spfzero 5y ago
What Facebook really believes is that they can escalate this and buy themselves a few months even knowing they will eventually loose. Whether or not it is eventually enforced, they’ve bought some time and they can easily afford the cost.
PontifexMinimus 5y ago
> Bureaucrats may be powerful Bureaucrats are not as powerful as politicians, and I think that the EU is slowly and belatedly coming to the realisation that it needs to control its computing and communications infrastructure, in order for it to preserve independence from the other big powers -- such as the USA and China. So I think that it's quite possible in the coming years that the German and EU authorities will come to the conclusion that Facebook are too big for their boots and need to be taken down a peg or two -- for example by requiring them to divest themselves of Instagram and other acquisitions, or maybe banning them from the EU entirely and building their own alternatives.

anoncake 5y ago

> Perhaps Facebook believes that the regulator has stepped beyond its legal authority and would prefer to have a court decide the matter? Then they can contest the injunction and if wasn't justified, it will be revoked. But they can't just ignore it.

asdfasgasdgasdg 5y ago
Apparently they can just ignore it, though, at the risk of whatever consequences would apply. I confess I do not know the details of the legalities around this particular injunction, whether it behaves like an American injunction, etc. I notice that not a court but a commissioner issued this injunction, and not even a commissioner with authority over all of Germany, but one just within the (state? province? municipality?) of Hamburg. I'm not sure whether that is of any import but it does seem odd to me. Like, if the city of Atlanta had a privacy commission and ordered Facebook not to do something, Facebook would probably just ignore that since cities in the U.S. do not have the power to regulate interstate commerce. I have no idea whether the same type of limitation exists in this case. Presumably Facebook weighed the risks before going ahead. We'll see if their decision turns out to be the right one.
- fakedang 5y ago
  Just pointing out that Hamburg is a free city republican state within the federal republic of Germany. So I don't think it carries any water.
- anoncake 5y ago
  Hamburg is a state, and laws are generally executed by the states in Germany. That includes federal and union laws. So that's perfectly normal. I don't know if the the injunction technically applies to all of Germany, but since Facebook doesn't necessarily know if someone is from Hamburg, it probably doesn't matter in practice. In the long run, you can only operate in a jurisdiction in which you are welcome. Especially when your position is unique like Facebook's. A foreign company that openly ignores the law is not and I can only attribute Facebook's behaviour to arrogance.

spfzero 5y ago

What Facebook really believes is that they can escalate this and buy themselves a few months even knowing they will eventually loose. Whether or not it is eventually enforced, they’ve bought some time and they can easily afford the cost.

PontifexMinimus 5y ago

> Bureaucrats may be powerful Bureaucrats are not as powerful as politicians, and I think that the EU is slowly and belatedly coming to the realisation that it needs to control its computing and communications infrastructure, in order for it to preserve independence from the other big powers -- such as the USA and China. So I think that it's quite possible in the coming years that the German and EU authorities will come to the conclusion that Facebook are too big for their boots and need to be taken down a peg or two -- for example by requiring them to divest themselves of Instagram and other acquisitions, or maybe banning them from the EU entirely and building their own alternatives.