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Can't help seeing the irony that the censored document is a declaration by the publisher about how strongly they are committed to freedom of expression in inter

Can't help seeing the irony that the censored document is a declaration by the publisher about how strongly they are committed to freedom of expression in international context.. CORRECTION: As other have pointed out, the publisher is actually the student newspaper, which is independent from Purdue University itself.

jmull 5y ago
The letter is from the president of Purdue, while the web site is a news site that is independent of the university. Also, it’s not really censorship — they have to deal with the GDPR headache, one way or the other, just like everyone else. Simply blocking the EU is a blunt but simple and effective way of doing so, and makes decent sense for a site where the interest is 99% local.
- hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
  > they have to deal with the GDPR headache What headache? A sensible solution: when EU visitor is detected, don't set cookies. Purdue solution: when EU visitor is detected, block them.
  - quartz 5y ago
    > What headache? A sensible solution: when EU visitor is detected, don't set cookies. The headache is convincing someone to pay a lawyer to agree that this is the solution when serving content to the EU is outside your publication's mission. Also: The Exponent isn't Purdue, it's independent. Purdue chose email as their publication medium.
    - hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
      The GDPR is about personal data. It can get complex when you actually start to deal with personal data. You need to notify users, enable them to modify their data and so on. For many platforms this is already very easy or built in, for some like ERP systems it was quite complicated. Fortunately there exist a very simple solution: don't gather personal data. Note that it does not necessarily applies to cookies: they are considered personal data only if they can be used to identify the individual.[0] There is exactly zero chance anybody would go after you if you don't set cookies or set them for reasons other than making personal identification possible. [0] https://www.itgovernance.eu/blog/en/how-the-gdpr-affects-cookie-policies https://www.itgovernance.eu/blog/en/how-the-gdpr-affects-coo...
  - josefx 5y ago
    Not sure if that is enough. They seem to have facebook and twitter links and as far as I remember these usually come in a JavaScript spyware bundle and those are only the obvious ones.
  - mikewarot 5y ago
    >when EU visitor is detected, don't set cookies How do you know that somewhere in the stack of things the server is running isn't something that would set a cookie for some valid reason, and thus trigger the EU's stupid laws? A positive stop, the redirect to a text page, is far better than a hope and a prayer.
    - hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
      Not setting cookies is a radical solution. Actually there is no problem with cookies at all unless they are being used to identify the individual. [0] So by definition any valid reason causes absolutely no problem. It is only if you decide that you want to deal with personally identifiable information, transfer it to third parties etc., it becomes problematic. People in the EU quickly learned not to do that and we're very happy about it. [0] https://www.itgovernance.eu/blog/en/how-the-gdpr-affects-cookie-policies https://www.itgovernance.eu/blog/en/how-the-gdpr-affects-coo...
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - PixyMisa 5y ago
    Dealing with the GDPR costs money. Blocking the entire EU is free. This started happening even before the GDPR was finalised.
jaclaz 5y ago
>Can't help seeing the irony that the censored document is a declaration by the publisher about how strongly they are committed to freedom of expression in international context.. Yep, and - also ironically - the root of publisher is the same as public, so you want to make something public but you restrict the access to a whole subset of the public. Besides that, if they had written (without recurring to http 451[0]) a simple message like: "We are sorry but we cannot serve this content due to the possible non-compliance of this site with EU Laws (GDPR)" it would have been (IMHO) much more correct/polite. I read the message "as is" more like: Hallo, stupid visitor from Europe, you are denied access to the contents because you voted stupid people that wrote stupid laws that we won't respect. The page served should be reachable even from non EU countries: https://www.purdueexponent.org/campus/article_aa3e67de-5de9-11ec-9246-af6384980cbb.html https://www.purdueexponent.org/campus/article_aa3e67de-5de9-... and it has some interesting html keywords in "base": <meta name="keywords" content="mitch, daniels, mitch daniels, purdue, central intelligence agency, chinese embassy, tiananmen square, zhihao kong"> <meta name="news_keywords" content="mitch, daniels, mitch daniels, purdue, central intelligence agency, chinese embassy, tiananmen square, zhihao kong"> [0] the example on Wikipedia is a good one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_451 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_451
outside1234 5y ago
Also, they don't have the money to comply with the EU's GDPR from a legal requirement, so this is really a result of the EU's laws.
- shuger 5y ago
  If you don't collect data on the visitors you don't need to do anything to comply.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]

jmull 5y ago

The letter is from the president of Purdue, while the web site is a news site that is independent of the university. Also, it’s not really censorship — they have to deal with the GDPR headache, one way or the other, just like everyone else. Simply blocking the EU is a blunt but simple and effective way of doing so, and makes decent sense for a site where the interest is 99% local.

hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
> they have to deal with the GDPR headache What headache? A sensible solution: when EU visitor is detected, don't set cookies. Purdue solution: when EU visitor is detected, block them.
- quartz 5y ago
  > What headache? A sensible solution: when EU visitor is detected, don't set cookies. The headache is convincing someone to pay a lawyer to agree that this is the solution when serving content to the EU is outside your publication's mission. Also: The Exponent isn't Purdue, it's independent. Purdue chose email as their publication medium.
  - hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
    The GDPR is about personal data. It can get complex when you actually start to deal with personal data. You need to notify users, enable them to modify their data and so on. For many platforms this is already very easy or built in, for some like ERP systems it was quite complicated. Fortunately there exist a very simple solution: don't gather personal data. Note that it does not necessarily applies to cookies: they are considered personal data only if they can be used to identify the individual.[0] There is exactly zero chance anybody would go after you if you don't set cookies or set them for reasons other than making personal identification possible. [0] https://www.itgovernance.eu/blog/en/how-the-gdpr-affects-cookie-policies https://www.itgovernance.eu/blog/en/how-the-gdpr-affects-coo...
- josefx 5y ago
  Not sure if that is enough. They seem to have facebook and twitter links and as far as I remember these usually come in a JavaScript spyware bundle and those are only the obvious ones.
- mikewarot 5y ago
  >when EU visitor is detected, don't set cookies How do you know that somewhere in the stack of things the server is running isn't something that would set a cookie for some valid reason, and thus trigger the EU's stupid laws? A positive stop, the redirect to a text page, is far better than a hope and a prayer.
  - hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
    Not setting cookies is a radical solution. Actually there is no problem with cookies at all unless they are being used to identify the individual. [0] So by definition any valid reason causes absolutely no problem. It is only if you decide that you want to deal with personally identifiable information, transfer it to third parties etc., it becomes problematic. People in the EU quickly learned not to do that and we're very happy about it. [0] https://www.itgovernance.eu/blog/en/how-the-gdpr-affects-cookie-policies https://www.itgovernance.eu/blog/en/how-the-gdpr-affects-coo...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- PixyMisa 5y ago
  Dealing with the GDPR costs money. Blocking the entire EU is free. This started happening even before the GDPR was finalised.

jaclaz 5y ago

>Can't help seeing the irony that the censored document is a declaration by the publisher about how strongly they are committed to freedom of expression in international context.. Yep, and - also ironically - the root of publisher is the same as public, so you want to make something public but you restrict the access to a whole subset of the public. Besides that, if they had written (without recurring to http 451[0]) a simple message like: "We are sorry but we cannot serve this content due to the possible non-compliance of this site with EU Laws (GDPR)" it would have been (IMHO) much more correct/polite. I read the message "as is" more like: Hallo, stupid visitor from Europe, you are denied access to the contents because you voted stupid people that wrote stupid laws that we won't respect. The page served should be reachable even from non EU countries: https://www.purdueexponent.org/campus/article_aa3e67de-5de9-11ec-9246-af6384980cbb.html https://www.purdueexponent.org/campus/article_aa3e67de-5de9-... and it has some interesting html keywords in "base": <meta name="keywords" content="mitch, daniels, mitch daniels, purdue, central intelligence agency, chinese embassy, tiananmen square, zhihao kong"> <meta name="news_keywords" content="mitch, daniels, mitch daniels, purdue, central intelligence agency, chinese embassy, tiananmen square, zhihao kong"> [0] the example on Wikipedia is a good one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_451 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_451

outside1234 5y ago

Also, they don't have the money to comply with the EU's GDPR from a legal requirement, so this is really a result of the EU's laws.

shuger 5y ago
If you don't collect data on the visitors you don't need to do anything to comply.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]