5 ms·

Laws can change. Data is transferred forever. I'd rather have data NOT transferred (AND laws to protect it, but this is moot if it is not there).

by jraph 5y ago

alexfromapex 5y ago
It makes me uncomfortable to see how much tech companies spend lobbying, decentralized data is probably the most appropriate way to protect peoples' data.
lumost 5y ago
In light of this it's fairly suprising that there aren't more laws forcing data to remain inside of the country or guaranteeing continuity of service. It would make for a pretty big hammer, but countries could theoretically force local corporations to perform arbitrary actions on data hosted in country e.g. Shut FB down for a country, block access to hosted photos, cease providing cloud monitoring/actions for a refinery. While historically the majority of global tech firms were headquartered in the US and the US had friendly treaty deals with most of the world. Neither of those statements seem like a sure bet in the 2030s.
- emn13 5y ago
  If you consider that laws tend to be passed to support populism first, business interests second, and national security somewhere well down the hierarchy, and citizens right even lower than that... it's not really that surprising. Only when populism happens to support issues such as national security or citizens rights do those issues tend to receive any attention. That's how the GDPR got in (and it also explains why it's so problematic for small business but less so much for large businesses). Stuff like privacy shield just don't make sense unless you consider that lobbying and business interests tend to rule the day-to-day decision making in Brussels just as much as in Washington. Specifically, note that most of the major "US" tech companies are major economic players in the EU too, and will have influence therefore - and I'm using scare quotes because such corporations have legal entities in all kinds of jurisdictions, and revenue and business in all kinds of places. Thinking of them as being from one country exclusively is kind of misleading from the perspective of where they have influence.
  - ABCLAW 5y ago
    >If you consider that laws tend to be passed to support populism first, business interests second [...] It's been a while since I looked into this, but my understanding is that quantitatively this is almost the opposite of what actually occurs: https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/fi... "Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence."
    - emn13 5y ago
      I meant populism in the pejorative political sense, not in the sense of popular with rational, self-interested and well-informed voters, say. As in populism: when various actors tout extremely simplistic (and generally bad faith) solutions to painful, complex, or even misdirected problems via emotional appeals. I was under the impression that's how people usually use the word nowadays, but that might have been my mistake ;-). Unfortunately, it's just very, very rare to have sufficient unity within the electorate for old-style populism (in the positive sense as in representing the will of the people) to have much active, helpful impact. Maybe it helps sustain well-regarded accomplishments, and thus acts in a harder to see fashion? In any case, when I ranked citizens everyday rights (not just emotional appeals to concepts) as pretty much dead last in the priorities of the elected leaders, that aligns with the text you quoted. But the GDPR is also a product of its time, and emotional appeals play a role here too. Peoples mistrust of big tech surely helped bring this to the forefront, even if the actual rules probably help avoid competition by being practically very burdensome for small competitors - and it wouldn't surprise me if corporate lobbying had a hand in ensuring that outcome. And perhaps stuff like NSA's spying on EU leaders helped stiffen their spine against US corporate interests; because the snowden stories would have been breaking around the same time, (IIRC?). In any case: the point is that I'm quite skeptical that the GDPR somehow managed what most legislation does not, which is to actually place citizens rights first. The emotional appeals combined with the fairly poor result (in practice - the idea is sound) sure seems to suggest that as usual, even here, normal political reality was quite present and that it was drafted and passed while protecting major corporate interests and firing up the emotional appeals of political leaders. It's a little ironic that part of that appeal was likely the fact that they were sticking it to those pesky foreign (american) firms... when in fact those very firms were among the best protected by the legislation.
- jpalomaki 5y ago
  I think it is more important who is managing the servers and systems hosting the data than actual location. Even if Google or Facebook was storing my data in their data centers in Sweden or Finland I don’t really think my data would be outside the reach of US agencies.
youeseh 5y ago
Laws are both slower to enact and slower to change compared to executive action.
labster 5y ago
I think you have it backwards, unfortunately. Data can always be deleted, but American laws can’t be changed. With an evenly split Senate, where the opposition has declared a “100% focus” on stopping the government’s agenda, and you need 60% to pass anything — let’s just say that all non-spending bills are effectively dead for the next 18 months. And most likely, far beyond that. Laws can’t really change here, so we have to live with the system we have, and hope that courts interpret the laws in better ways.
- asdff 5y ago
  Laws get undone all the time. Prohibition, slavery, gay marriage, segregation, etc.
  - labster 5y ago
    Sure, most of your examples are a century old. The new America all legislation happens through the courts, like with gay marriage. We have collectively decided that gridlock is preferable to working with the other team in all cases.
- jraph 5y ago
  Data can always be deleted but you have no guarantees that it will. Said otherwise: - if you want the data to be gone, don't assume it is - if you want the data to be backed up, don't assume it is Said otherwise: - expect data to be there forever, unless you wish so. Then, expect data to be gone just before you want it back. And, I don't have any guarantee whatsoever that a law protecting something related to me in a remote country will be left untouched. I don't even have any say on it, as a non citizen of this country.

Laws can change. Data is transferred forever. I'd rather have data NOT transferred (AND laws to protect it, but this is moot if it is not there).

by jraph 5y ago

Laws can change. Data is transferred forever. I'd rather have data NOT transferred (AND laws to protect it, but this is moot if it is not there).

alexfromapex 5y ago

It makes me uncomfortable to see how much tech companies spend lobbying, decentralized data is probably the most appropriate way to protect peoples' data.

lumost 5y ago

In light of this it's fairly suprising that there aren't more laws forcing data to remain inside of the country or guaranteeing continuity of service. It would make for a pretty big hammer, but countries could theoretically force local corporations to perform arbitrary actions on data hosted in country e.g. Shut FB down for a country, block access to hosted photos, cease providing cloud monitoring/actions for a refinery. While historically the majority of global tech firms were headquartered in the US and the US had friendly treaty deals with most of the world. Neither of those statements seem like a sure bet in the 2030s.

emn13 5y ago
If you consider that laws tend to be passed to support populism first, business interests second, and national security somewhere well down the hierarchy, and citizens right even lower than that... it's not really that surprising. Only when populism happens to support issues such as national security or citizens rights do those issues tend to receive any attention. That's how the GDPR got in (and it also explains why it's so problematic for small business but less so much for large businesses). Stuff like privacy shield just don't make sense unless you consider that lobbying and business interests tend to rule the day-to-day decision making in Brussels just as much as in Washington. Specifically, note that most of the major "US" tech companies are major economic players in the EU too, and will have influence therefore - and I'm using scare quotes because such corporations have legal entities in all kinds of jurisdictions, and revenue and business in all kinds of places. Thinking of them as being from one country exclusively is kind of misleading from the perspective of where they have influence.
- ABCLAW 5y ago
  >If you consider that laws tend to be passed to support populism first, business interests second [...] It's been a while since I looked into this, but my understanding is that quantitatively this is almost the opposite of what actually occurs: https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/fi... "Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence."
  - emn13 5y ago
    I meant populism in the pejorative political sense, not in the sense of popular with rational, self-interested and well-informed voters, say. As in populism: when various actors tout extremely simplistic (and generally bad faith) solutions to painful, complex, or even misdirected problems via emotional appeals. I was under the impression that's how people usually use the word nowadays, but that might have been my mistake ;-). Unfortunately, it's just very, very rare to have sufficient unity within the electorate for old-style populism (in the positive sense as in representing the will of the people) to have much active, helpful impact. Maybe it helps sustain well-regarded accomplishments, and thus acts in a harder to see fashion? In any case, when I ranked citizens everyday rights (not just emotional appeals to concepts) as pretty much dead last in the priorities of the elected leaders, that aligns with the text you quoted. But the GDPR is also a product of its time, and emotional appeals play a role here too. Peoples mistrust of big tech surely helped bring this to the forefront, even if the actual rules probably help avoid competition by being practically very burdensome for small competitors - and it wouldn't surprise me if corporate lobbying had a hand in ensuring that outcome. And perhaps stuff like NSA's spying on EU leaders helped stiffen their spine against US corporate interests; because the snowden stories would have been breaking around the same time, (IIRC?). In any case: the point is that I'm quite skeptical that the GDPR somehow managed what most legislation does not, which is to actually place citizens rights first. The emotional appeals combined with the fairly poor result (in practice - the idea is sound) sure seems to suggest that as usual, even here, normal political reality was quite present and that it was drafted and passed while protecting major corporate interests and firing up the emotional appeals of political leaders. It's a little ironic that part of that appeal was likely the fact that they were sticking it to those pesky foreign (american) firms... when in fact those very firms were among the best protected by the legislation.
jpalomaki 5y ago
I think it is more important who is managing the servers and systems hosting the data than actual location. Even if Google or Facebook was storing my data in their data centers in Sweden or Finland I don’t really think my data would be outside the reach of US agencies.

youeseh 5y ago

Laws are both slower to enact and slower to change compared to executive action.

labster 5y ago

I think you have it backwards, unfortunately. Data can always be deleted, but American laws can’t be changed. With an evenly split Senate, where the opposition has declared a “100% focus” on stopping the government’s agenda, and you need 60% to pass anything — let’s just say that all non-spending bills are effectively dead for the next 18 months. And most likely, far beyond that. Laws can’t really change here, so we have to live with the system we have, and hope that courts interpret the laws in better ways.

asdff 5y ago
Laws get undone all the time. Prohibition, slavery, gay marriage, segregation, etc.
- labster 5y ago
  Sure, most of your examples are a century old. The new America all legislation happens through the courts, like with gay marriage. We have collectively decided that gridlock is preferable to working with the other team in all cases.
jraph 5y ago
Data can always be deleted but you have no guarantees that it will. Said otherwise: - if you want the data to be gone, don't assume it is - if you want the data to be backed up, don't assume it is Said otherwise: - expect data to be there forever, unless you wish so. Then, expect data to be gone just before you want it back. And, I don't have any guarantee whatsoever that a law protecting something related to me in a remote country will be left untouched. I don't even have any say on it, as a non citizen of this country.