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T-Mobile USA doesn't comply with its German parent company’s GDPR policies
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- meibo 4y agoThey've been lying and ripping off customers while obstructing the German internet infrastructure for profit since they've been privatized. It's a very popular business model here, see DB.
- Semaphor 4y ago> It's a very popular business model here, see DB. DB is a bad example, fake-privatized and controlled by the government. It gets you the worst of both worlds.
- eliaspro 4y agoTheir lobbying and squeezing every single cent they could get out of legacy copper infrastructure which was too be replaced in the early eighties until today held back Germany's internet infrastructure and competition for decades.
- kuschku 4y agoDTAG and the Kohl government set our country's infrastructure back decades.
- blueflow 4y agoDon't forget the DTAG peering controversy. I once worked for them, imagine my face when i had to call the internal IT to reset a password and ended up in a Callcenter in Bulgaria.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- croes 4y agoDB isn't a private company
- blueflow 4y agoGP did say that it got privatized, not that its a private company. Privatization has a range of meanings, which also include things that do not end up in a privately-owned company.
- josefx 4y agoIt is run as a private company despite being state owned. Some EU regulations require that all European train networks compete like commercial entities which ads limitations to financing the DB and creates a lot of bad incentives. Like letting infrastructure rot, because complete renewals and replacements are paid by the government while upkeep isn't.
- microtonal 4y agoInternet infrastructure is pretty dysfunctional in Germany. I lived in Germany for five years and the only alternative for Telekom’s mediocre VDSL infrastructure was UnityMedia’s almost equally bad connectivity. UnityMedia rarely delivered the promised bandwidth and would regularly have connectivity issues for hours. (And don’t get me started in DS-Lite.) I was recently discussing the mediocre German internet infrastructure with a colleague and suggested that they’d probably be better off with 5G, only to find out that ‘unlimited’ 5G in Germany has insane prices (3-4 times that of neighboring countries)
- Mo3 4y agoThis is true. I am from Germany, you are spot on in your observations. I live in the Netherlands now and the difference is mind-boggling. I have 1Gbit/s fiber (that actually delivers 1Gbit/s) and truly unlimited 5G (that is actually available in every corner of the country) for a combined 50 bucks or so.
- sofixa 4y agoSimilar here in France, for around 50€/month i get 2Gbps down/~1Gbps up fiber, and 200GB of 5G (after that it downgrades to 4G which is unlimited). Plus TV and cheaper Netflix, one year of Disney+ free.
- atwood22 4y agoDon't forget the multi-month lead times to even get connected to the internet. I lived without the internet for 3 months when I first moved to Germany. I read over 30 books that year.
- wongarsu 4y ago3 months certainly happens, and there are horror stories of it taking much longer, but the last two times I moved it was closer to one month. And by now some providers give you a free 4G connection to your WIFI router until you get connected, so at least they realized it's an issue worth competing over.
- 4y ago
- Semaphor 4y agoIs there at some point a link to the claim that DT policies apply to their subsidiaries? I wouldn’t assume they do, but at least I’d like to read about that. edit: Found it way down the page: https://www.telekom.com/resource/blob/323318/ce2bab699cb8cb249bd66fa2d905e956/dl-binding-corporate-rules-privacy-data.pdf https://www.telekom.com/resource/blob/323318/ce2bab699cb8cb2... edit2: Fascinating, the term "independent stock corporation" seems to be exclusively used by German-speaking companies: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%22independent+stock+corporation%22&ia=web https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%22independent+stock+corporation%2...
- lozenge 4y agoIt doesn't support his case. "Data collected in Europe shall be processed generally in accordance with the legal provisions of the country in which the data was collected, regardless of where the data is processed, but at the very least in accordance with the requirements of these Binding Corporate Rules Privacy." His data wasn't collected in Europe. " For Deutsche Telekom AG from July 01, 2014 in accordance with approval by the Board of Management on June 10, 2014. In the domestic Group companies, as per board approval or decision of the responsible board member." Where's the board approval of the US board? How about the GDPR? " The whole point of the GDPR is to protect data belonging to EU citizens and residents. The law, therefore, applies to organizations that handle such data whether they are EU-based organizations or not, known as “extra-territorial effect.”" (gdpr.eu) Is he an EU citizen?
- jeroenhd 4y ago> Is he an EU citizen? Based on his biography (hasbrouck.org/bio/whoami.html) I believe he is an American citizen. I see records about him being born in the USA and nothing about any moves to a European country (other than his world travels for activism and other short-term purposes). If he were a European citizen, I'd expect his complaints to be directed at his local DPA rather than at DT/T-Mobile directly. I'm no lawyer so I'm not sure how legally binding his communication with T-Mobile/DT about the exact use of his data really is.
- 4y ago
- martin_a 4y agotldr; but is this an American complaining that a US-based company is collecting lots of data and does not want to tell him which exactly, so he starts pulling out the GDPR because the mother company is EU-based? That contains quite some irony.
- Semaphor 4y agoNah, it’s more that DT has a statement "Binding Corporate Rules Privacy" which could apply to T-Mobile US as it has language about subsidiaries. And this is a user who specifically tries to choose EU companies for privacy reasons. So no irony either.
- jraph 4y agoAs a European person, I would support US people seeking to have something like the GDPR. I'd be very happy if the US adopted something like this.
- martin_a 4y agoI would _totally_ support that, too, yes. But that actual law in the US is just so far away from that, don't see how that would be possible.
- pessimizer 4y agoI don't recognize any irony. It's just a observation that T-Mobile doesn't believe in German law. It's at least useful information for Germans, in case they're ever tempted to get rid of the laws and let T-Mobile "self-regulate."
- martin_a 4y agoIt does believe in German law, but the author is neither German nor an European citizen, but a customer of a US company. GDPR does not apply to him.
- sneak 4y agoThis is a reminder that when you find yourself in abusive relationships with companies, and all of your options are: - similarly abusive - nationwide - limited in number - similar in price You are almost always dealing with a case of government corruption. The high prices you pay for bad service are going to friends of the regulatory authority, just like a tax you never voted on. You can see this in the US with retail banking, internet access, cell service, etc. "We don’t care. We don’t have to. We’re the Phone Company."
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- sofixa 4y agoNo, you're dealing with an oligopoly. Sometimes it's a "natural" one, where the characteristics of the segment make competition hard or impossible (e.g. infrastructure, utilities due to capital costs and physical limitations involved) - in that case government regulation is mandatory to enforce some sort of decent consumer protections (like forced interoperability/mobility, limit abusive contracts, etc.). Sometimes it's regulatory capture (where regulations are so heavy very few competitors can afford to be present). Sometimes it's just the market that consolidates (e.g. multiple entertainment markets like video games, movie studios) even though they shouldn't be allowed to this point. Government corruption is rarely the main, or even among the main causes of oligopolies (in developed countries, YMMV elsewhere).
- pessimizer 4y agoWhat other thing do you think continuing lack of regulation or regulatory capture (which costs companies plenty to do) are the result of? That's what you're paying people for. That is the corruption. You're saying that the flu is a result of sneezing.
- LinuxBender 4y agoFor what it's worth, I think you are both right. It is an oligopoly and it is heavily colluding with governments. When I was in the wireless industry I saw multiple facets of this. We could do literally anything as we were beset-of-friends with many of the three letter agencies. We had unlimited lobbyists and could kick any law down the road. One prime example would be the hands-free law that was going into effect in the late 90's. We kicked that can far down the road because the phone tech just wasn't ready for it. We were also able to silence what today are called security researchers. I was also required to give agencies unfettered and un-logged access into the mainframes PBX telco switches that routed calls and controlled the cell sites. We also had very little competition due to written and unwritten agreements that allowed us to focus on specific regions.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- lozenge 4y agoFlagged for vague title. "T Mobile US refuses to apply GDPR".
- joshuaissac 4y agoEditorialising the title is against the guidelines.
- Ekaros 4y agoAnd funnily the GDPR doesn't apply just because T-Mobile is owned by EU company. The person making queries must be in EU.
- eloeffler 4y agoNot sure if you're saying that GDPR only applies if a person from EU files an information request or not. Anyway, here's the relevant article that states that GDPR applies if the Data Processor/Controller is based in the EU: "This Regulation applies to the processing of personal data in the context of the activities of an establishment of a controller or a processor in the Union, regardless of whether the processing takes place in the Union or not." https://gdpr.eu/article-3-requirements-of-handling-personal-data-of-subjects-in-the-union/ https://gdpr.eu/article-3-requirements-of-handling-personal-...
- pc86 4y agoGDPR applies to EU citizens and residents only: " The whole point of the GDPR is to protect data belonging to EU citizens and residents. The law, therefore, applies to organizations that handle such data whether they are EU-based organizations or not, known as “extra-territorial effect.”" (gdpr.eu)
- einpoklum 4y agoYour quote verifies that the GDPR applies to the personal data of _all_ people, processed by organizations subject to the GDPR.
- dschuetz 4y agoBeing a DTAG customer is not that great in Germany either.
- wink 4y agoYou need to pick your poison though. I don't like defending them but unlike mnet and Vodafone they deliver a working product.
- erinnh 4y agoIve very much been happy with O2 for the last three years. For mobile phone as well as DSL access. For mobile they gave me a new 100% unlimited (data&speed) contract for 25€ a month. Cant really complain about that. For home internet its been rock-solid and I cant think of even one disconnection in the last years. Peering is better than Telekom as well.
- rollo 4y agoJust step out of the city, and boom no mobile connection with O2.
- erinnh 4y agoI am out of the city.(close to Dutch border) O2 is best here. Even better than Telekom. I do understand that its not universal. But O2 is a pretty good alternative. Especially if I consider than I pay one third of the price that a similar contract would cost me with Telekom.
- fuzzy2 4y agoIt's actually the opposite: go inside a city, boom, no mobile data. Luckily, things have improved and network cells aren't overloaded all the time. In the countryside, all networks are hit and miss.
- welterde 4y agoI had mnet for a couple years and no problems whatsoever. They even had IPv6 much earlier than the competition. Also had Vodafone for a while and it was fine (but just as with DTAG one has to be lucky that the local segment is not overloaded). However unlike mnet and Vodafone, DTAG never works, since they overload their peering links to other internet providers on purpose. This means that accessing any website or service that isn't explicitly paying DTAG to get unrestricted access to their customers, performs very poorly. See for example Youtube being barely usable in evenings for years. None of the other internet providers had that issue.
- KingOfCoders 4y agoThe three worst (large) companies in Germany: 1. Deutsche Bahn (former state railroad) 2. Deutsche Telekom (former state telecom) 3. Deutsche Post (former state postal service) What a coincidence.
- erinnh 4y agoIm going to disagree quite a lot. Deutsche Bank is massively worse than any of them for society and to most customers. Vonovia is a stain on society. No doubt there are many many worse companies for various reasons than the three you listed. Deutsche Bahn is inefficient. But I have no idea why you consider them all that terrible. Deutsche Post isnt even all that bad. Theyre one of the best companies in the public package delivery space.
- KingOfCoders 4y agoI'm no longer a Deutsche Bank customer as they were so bad, so I don't know ;-) DHL is bad because they underpay their employees so in a large city, employees will dump their packages at the first door, very annoying if you life in a large house with many flats, you have to search for the person who took the parcel - even if you're there they will not ring the bell, just dump everything. Deutsche Post next to me you usually wait 30+ minutes in a long line (dozens of people) with the unfriendliest employees possible, it has a 1.9 (!) rating on Google. (I have no car) Deutsche Bahn is incompetent, trains cancelled, too late, wrong car order, non working climate control, 1st class car missing, restaurant closed and much much more. Deutsche Telekom wouldn't activate fiber for nearly a year although everything was build and finished. Computer said no, no one wanted to come and see that everything is ready (they installed everything) because the computer was in an inconsistent state (20+ calls plus a lot of escalation worked after nearly a year of me paying 99EUR/month 5G for my remote work).
- Semaphor 4y ago> DHL is bad because they underpay their employees so in a large city The others pay worse, then. DHL has by far the best delivery for me, closely followed by Amazon, then it’s UPS (though they are used so rarely, my samplesize is tiny), and finally DPD and GLS. Oh, and of course there is "roll the dice delivery" aka Hermes.
- croes 4y agoI doubt that any company can provide GDPR like data protection in the US to US citizens if it's not provided by US law. They must comply to US law no matter if they are a subsidiary or not. It's pretty naive to think otherwise
- Ekaros 4y agoAnd my understanding is that GDRP applies to persons in EU. So just using company owned by European entity doesn't make you a subject. You would need to be in EU when transaction happens.
- tehlike 4y agoGDPR should be covering EU citizen's data, anywhere.
- eatbitseveryday 4y agoHow does that work with an EU citizen living outside the EU? Every business would either have to apply GPDR universally, or they’d have to know which customers are citizens, even in their local jurisdiction. Most just look at your IP address, which is not accurate.
- 0xCMP 4y agoYes, that is basically the idea. it can only be enforced for european citizens, but everyone must comply.
- nyokodo 4y ago> everyone must comply. Enforcement is going to be difficult for companies owned and operating entirely outside the EU. Of course that doesn’t apply to T-Mobile.
- eatbitseveryday 4y ago
- ok_dad 4y agoWhether or not the whole gdpr direction will work or not for this guy doesn’t matter much because it’s only gonna work in the same context. The USA desperately needs some law that says you can see what data a company has on you at anytime for free and request all of that data to be deleted as well. Anything less is just a loophole to be closed someday.
- joecool1029 4y ago>The USA desperately needs some law that says you can see what data a company has on you at anytime for free and request all of that data to be deleted as well. Anything less is just a loophole to be closed someday. Correct me if I'm wrong, but California has some subset of this law already in place with CCPA. Unlike EU, it's theoretically possible a California judge could extend jurisdiction to my company in another state and drag my ass over there, so I have to care about it. EU has no such power over me unless I choose to operate over there and locate servers there.
- malka 4y agowhat is the point of sending that much message, to an entity that clearly communicate in lawyer. Usually if I am not happy after the first round of message, I immediatly lawyer up.
- ehasbrouck 4y agoauf deutsch: "Fast 50 Millionen US-Konten betroffen: Telekom-Gruppe verschweigt Informationen über gehackte Personendaten", Matthias Monroy, Netspolitik.org, 16.08.2022: Fast die Hälfte der Millionen Kund:innen von T-Mobile in den USA waren vor einem Jahr Opfer eines riesigen Datenverlustes. Die Deutsche Telekom als Mutterkonzern verletzt seitdem ihre selbst auferlegten Verpflichtungen zum Datenschutz. https://netzpolitik.org/2022/fast-50-millionen-us-konten-betroffen-telekom-gruppe-verschweigt-informationen-ueber-gehackte-personendaten/ https://netzpolitik.org/2022/fast-50-millionen-us-konten-bet...
- huslage 4y agoT-Mobile USA is not a subidiary of Deutche Telekom, but an independent US company which is mostly owned by them. It is subject to the laws of the US and Washington state, not Germany.