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I am the first person to appreciate the pro-online-privacy legislation from the EU in the last couple of years. Yet...How can the same organization be behind t

I am the first person to appreciate the pro-online-privacy legislation from the EU in the last couple of years. Yet...How can the same organization be behind this? Is it a result of the sheer size of the org, with malevolent people reeking their ugly heads? A more cynical "privacy legislation as a smoke screen with totalitarian measures in the backend"?

mantas 4y ago
Both pro-privacy and anti-privacy have one common theme - more power to the state. And that's the point of EU bureaucrats. To gather as much power in their fight against both outside forces (e.g. US-based multinationals) and inside forces (member states).
- timeon 4y ago
  You really think those various actors are part of one plot? Also this is proposed not passed law. But you already have conclusion about whole org.
  - mantas 4y ago
    When this (as well as other similar laws) are pushed other and other again... I remember that saying by Juncker... We'll try again, and again, and again till it passes one time :) I'm not blaming every single bureaucrat. But direction of the organisation is pretty clear. Just like I don't blame every Facebook worker, but direction of that company is pretty clear too.
Semaphor 4y ago
I mean, we sent Ursula von der Leyen as head of the commission to the EU who became infamous in Germany for rather having CSAM stay online as long as she could prevent Germans from seeing it…
- mort96 4y ago
  Leyen is in favor of CSAM staying online? Do you have a source on that? Are you sure you're not misrepresenting her views?
  - hannob 4y ago
    The debate was going on a bit like this: "We should force DNS providers to block CSAM!" Internet activists: "Maybe it would be a better idea to ask the providers hosting this stuff to delete it?" - "WE SHOULD FORCE DNS PROVIDERS TO BLOCK CSAM! THESE INTERNET ACTIVISTS ARE SUPPORTING PEDOCRIMINALS!" (completely ignore what internet activists said)
  - Semaphor 4y ago
    People were begging her/them back then to, as a first step, include a requirement to send some kind of deletion request. Nada. Their list of CSAM that were apparently undeleteable (hence requiring internet blocks) were to a huge percentage deleted within days by Mogis (a German group of abused children against internet blocks) by simply mailing the provider where it was hosted. So I’m not sure what other way there is to read this.
  - bmn__ 4y ago
    I'm baffled that you give that woman the benefit of the doubt who literally earned the nickname Zensursula with her hide-instead-of-delete antics in 2009.
agilob 4y ago
>Yet...How can the same organization be behind this? Very easy. The organisation is huge and composed from 100000s of people working on different goals. They don't have any supervision, no democratic vote and if they decided they want to grow 400% in one year, they simply could and would, because no one feels like EU is "their government" they could easily protest against. If they want to create EU-Online-Child-Safety-Agency, they would just take our tax money and create it. What could you do against it? Shitpost online that you don't like it? It's too big and broad to control by citizens.
- pavlov 4y ago
  I'm afraid all of this comment is essentially nonsense. For starters, the EU system (including the Commission, all the various agencies across the Union, all courts, etc.) employs around 60,000 people. The government of Sweden alone employs more people for a population of only 10M. The EU is in fact fairly lean given its scope and the number of languages. National governments are responsible for implementing almost everything agreed by the Union members.
  - FireInsight 4y ago
    Probably overstated, but it's true that the EU gets arguably less democratic oversight than many governments.
    - whazor 4y ago
      Is it? I would rather say it is maybe too democratic. For an EU law to pass, both the EU parliament and EU council need to approve. So that means people vote for parties, that in turn are the EU parliament. Plus the EU council, which consists of the heads all the EU countries. That is a double layer of democracy. The only real difference is that EU gets very little media attention.
      - Aerroon 4y ago
        The EU has a language problem though. If there's a problem affecting Lithuania there's very little that voting can do to solve it. Lithuanians don't have an impact on the politicians voted in from other countries, because the politics don't overlap due to language. Lithuanian voters would have to convince German politicians, that campaign in the German language to German people, about Lithuania's issue. How likely do you think that is going to work?
bigDinosaur 4y ago
This is probably the biggest issue with having an executive which isn't formed by the actual members of parliament, particularly if that executive has powers that the parliament either cannot challenge by design or can't really challenge in practice. The EU commission really isn't democratic at all, and this is by design because of both the origins of the EU as a technocratic-economic project but also the EU parliament just sucks and doesn't really act like a parliament that governs. Because it doesn't really, the EU commission is the only thing people really talk about when it comes to the EU doing stuff. Sometimes the EU parliament will kick up a fuss but it's rare. The real fusses get kicked up in national parliaments.
- willyt 4y ago
  It's arguably still democratic in that each country, through its EU commissioner, gets one vote and the power to veto unless they've given up that veto for a specific issue which is done at a summit of all the national leaders of EU countries by signing a further treaty. If a country doesn't like what is happening they tell their elected national government to do something about it then the commissioner acts on the instructions received from the national government. Going from admittedly hazy memory from back in 2016, commissioners have a fixed term, I believe, and a national government can recall their commissioner if they are not doing what they are told. I think the EU parliament can also veto legislation proposed by the EU commission, but cannot create its own legislation. The things the EU commission can legislate are restricted by treaty, I've no idea what these restrictions are something I suspect that I share with 99.999% of people in this thread. So I would argue that the EU commission is less democratic than a directly elected EU parliament with the power to create any legislation it wants, but more democratic than say the House of Lords in the UK or the Supreme Court in the US where members are chosen by the elected government and can only be removed if they die, resign or commit some kind of heinous crime.
  - yywwbbn 4y ago
    The house of lords doesn’t actually have any meaningful role when actual decisions are being made. And the supreme court justices have to be approved by the senate. Of course you do have a point about them serving for life.
worldofmatthew 4y ago
Yes. Though I would also add a lot of it was about growing protectionism, in response to the EU not investing enough in the internet and acting surprised when USA's investments puts its companies on top.
- systemvoltage 4y ago
  Are there any Europeans here that don't agree with where the EU/WEF/etc agenda are going? Sitting here in US, it appears to be homogeneously moving in ever increasing regulations and hamstringing progress, but I am sure there is a great deal of debate about it? Are there groups in EU that are pushing back?
pelasaco 4y ago
"To protect the children" argument is the last refuge of a crook
seydor 4y ago
The effectiveness of EU machinery is overrated. EU is a large organization with lots and lots of money. The people who go there are largely unaccountable to their countries, and are likely to do things that are popular, and they like to show off their work. There is no repercussions for the decisions taken though, because the only elected positions (the parliament) are far removed from legislating and limited to just approving what other people promote. In the case of privacy laws, they sometimes don't even follow their own laws. E.g. as participants in an H2020-funded project, we were asked to add google-analytics to our website, because for EU officers, social proof is very important. We still have it btw, even though it's likely illegal. The privacy laws were enacted because some groups (led by german greens) were pushy about them -- there was very little push from the populace to enact such a kafkaesque system, and I am sure, that , if the populace were asked, the police and other authorities would not have been exempt from all these laws. I think it's popular in american (left) media to deify the EU as some kind of wise leader, while it's just as susceptible to corporate lobbying (and bribes , as shown recently) as any other government. This depiction of sainthood has not helped the EU evolve to fix its own problems. Recently in a podcast i heard Eric Schmidt admit that they were successfully pushing back against privacy regulation for at least 7 years.
- systemvoltage 4y ago
  It troubles me deeply that we in America often cannot make an argument about advocating something without using EU as a crutch. Both left and right wings of the political sphere. Examples: Ok: We shouldn’t allow abortion beyond trimester. Better: We shouldn’t allow abortion beyond trimester, that’s how it works in most EU countries. Ok: Vaccine mandates are not cool. Better: Vaccine mandates are not cool, just look at Sweden. Ok: Voting should require IDs. Better: Voting should require IDs, just look at EU. My country has a deep malaise of insecurity and inability to rationally think for itself. We were leading our ideas with basis of good arguments in 1950-1980s, then came all the things we want to idealize about EU. Nothing against EU, they should be promoting independent thought and not copy Americans either. Please don’t make arguments about what specific examples I gave. They may not be accurate but there are many more like this. The point to argue is not about vaccines or whatever, it’s about independent thought and policy.
cpa 4y ago
> How can the same organization be behind this? That's not specific to the EU. When it comes to national governments, each ministry/department often has conflicting goals. So, when digital issues are tackled by the Interior Minister, you get this type of law proposal, but when it's handled by the Digital or Justice Minister, it's (generally) a different story.
vmilner 4y ago
“We decide on something, leave it lying around and wait and see what happens. If no one kicks up a fuss, because most people don't understand what has been decided, we continue step by step until there is no turning back.” - Jean-Claude Juncker 1999

mantas 4y ago

Both pro-privacy and anti-privacy have one common theme - more power to the state. And that's the point of EU bureaucrats. To gather as much power in their fight against both outside forces (e.g. US-based multinationals) and inside forces (member states).

timeon 4y ago
You really think those various actors are part of one plot? Also this is proposed not passed law. But you already have conclusion about whole org.
- mantas 4y ago
  When this (as well as other similar laws) are pushed other and other again... I remember that saying by Juncker... We'll try again, and again, and again till it passes one time :) I'm not blaming every single bureaucrat. But direction of the organisation is pretty clear. Just like I don't blame every Facebook worker, but direction of that company is pretty clear too.

Semaphor 4y ago

I mean, we sent Ursula von der Leyen as head of the commission to the EU who became infamous in Germany for rather having CSAM stay online as long as she could prevent Germans from seeing it…

mort96 4y ago
Leyen is in favor of CSAM staying online? Do you have a source on that? Are you sure you're not misrepresenting her views?
- hannob 4y ago
  The debate was going on a bit like this: "We should force DNS providers to block CSAM!" Internet activists: "Maybe it would be a better idea to ask the providers hosting this stuff to delete it?" - "WE SHOULD FORCE DNS PROVIDERS TO BLOCK CSAM! THESE INTERNET ACTIVISTS ARE SUPPORTING PEDOCRIMINALS!" (completely ignore what internet activists said)
- Semaphor 4y ago
  People were begging her/them back then to, as a first step, include a requirement to send some kind of deletion request. Nada. Their list of CSAM that were apparently undeleteable (hence requiring internet blocks) were to a huge percentage deleted within days by Mogis (a German group of abused children against internet blocks) by simply mailing the provider where it was hosted. So I’m not sure what other way there is to read this.
- bmn__ 4y ago
  I'm baffled that you give that woman the benefit of the doubt who literally earned the nickname Zensursula with her hide-instead-of-delete antics in 2009.

agilob 4y ago

>Yet...How can the same organization be behind this? Very easy. The organisation is huge and composed from 100000s of people working on different goals. They don't have any supervision, no democratic vote and if they decided they want to grow 400% in one year, they simply could and would, because no one feels like EU is "their government" they could easily protest against. If they want to create EU-Online-Child-Safety-Agency, they would just take our tax money and create it. What could you do against it? Shitpost online that you don't like it? It's too big and broad to control by citizens.

pavlov 4y ago
I'm afraid all of this comment is essentially nonsense. For starters, the EU system (including the Commission, all the various agencies across the Union, all courts, etc.) employs around 60,000 people. The government of Sweden alone employs more people for a population of only 10M. The EU is in fact fairly lean given its scope and the number of languages. National governments are responsible for implementing almost everything agreed by the Union members.
- FireInsight 4y ago
  Probably overstated, but it's true that the EU gets arguably less democratic oversight than many governments.
  - whazor 4y ago
    Is it? I would rather say it is maybe too democratic. For an EU law to pass, both the EU parliament and EU council need to approve. So that means people vote for parties, that in turn are the EU parliament. Plus the EU council, which consists of the heads all the EU countries. That is a double layer of democracy. The only real difference is that EU gets very little media attention.
    - Aerroon 4y ago
      The EU has a language problem though. If there's a problem affecting Lithuania there's very little that voting can do to solve it. Lithuanians don't have an impact on the politicians voted in from other countries, because the politics don't overlap due to language. Lithuanian voters would have to convince German politicians, that campaign in the German language to German people, about Lithuania's issue. How likely do you think that is going to work?

bigDinosaur 4y ago

This is probably the biggest issue with having an executive which isn't formed by the actual members of parliament, particularly if that executive has powers that the parliament either cannot challenge by design or can't really challenge in practice. The EU commission really isn't democratic at all, and this is by design because of both the origins of the EU as a technocratic-economic project but also the EU parliament just sucks and doesn't really act like a parliament that governs. Because it doesn't really, the EU commission is the only thing people really talk about when it comes to the EU doing stuff. Sometimes the EU parliament will kick up a fuss but it's rare. The real fusses get kicked up in national parliaments.

willyt 4y ago
It's arguably still democratic in that each country, through its EU commissioner, gets one vote and the power to veto unless they've given up that veto for a specific issue which is done at a summit of all the national leaders of EU countries by signing a further treaty. If a country doesn't like what is happening they tell their elected national government to do something about it then the commissioner acts on the instructions received from the national government. Going from admittedly hazy memory from back in 2016, commissioners have a fixed term, I believe, and a national government can recall their commissioner if they are not doing what they are told. I think the EU parliament can also veto legislation proposed by the EU commission, but cannot create its own legislation. The things the EU commission can legislate are restricted by treaty, I've no idea what these restrictions are something I suspect that I share with 99.999% of people in this thread. So I would argue that the EU commission is less democratic than a directly elected EU parliament with the power to create any legislation it wants, but more democratic than say the House of Lords in the UK or the Supreme Court in the US where members are chosen by the elected government and can only be removed if they die, resign or commit some kind of heinous crime.
- yywwbbn 4y ago
  The house of lords doesn’t actually have any meaningful role when actual decisions are being made. And the supreme court justices have to be approved by the senate. Of course you do have a point about them serving for life.

worldofmatthew 4y ago

Yes. Though I would also add a lot of it was about growing protectionism, in response to the EU not investing enough in the internet and acting surprised when USA's investments puts its companies on top.

systemvoltage 4y ago
Are there any Europeans here that don't agree with where the EU/WEF/etc agenda are going? Sitting here in US, it appears to be homogeneously moving in ever increasing regulations and hamstringing progress, but I am sure there is a great deal of debate about it? Are there groups in EU that are pushing back?

pelasaco 4y ago

"To protect the children" argument is the last refuge of a crook

seydor 4y ago

The effectiveness of EU machinery is overrated. EU is a large organization with lots and lots of money. The people who go there are largely unaccountable to their countries, and are likely to do things that are popular, and they like to show off their work. There is no repercussions for the decisions taken though, because the only elected positions (the parliament) are far removed from legislating and limited to just approving what other people promote. In the case of privacy laws, they sometimes don't even follow their own laws. E.g. as participants in an H2020-funded project, we were asked to add google-analytics to our website, because for EU officers, social proof is very important. We still have it btw, even though it's likely illegal. The privacy laws were enacted because some groups (led by german greens) were pushy about them -- there was very little push from the populace to enact such a kafkaesque system, and I am sure, that , if the populace were asked, the police and other authorities would not have been exempt from all these laws. I think it's popular in american (left) media to deify the EU as some kind of wise leader, while it's just as susceptible to corporate lobbying (and bribes , as shown recently) as any other government. This depiction of sainthood has not helped the EU evolve to fix its own problems. Recently in a podcast i heard Eric Schmidt admit that they were successfully pushing back against privacy regulation for at least 7 years.

systemvoltage 4y ago
It troubles me deeply that we in America often cannot make an argument about advocating something without using EU as a crutch. Both left and right wings of the political sphere. Examples: Ok: We shouldn’t allow abortion beyond trimester. Better: We shouldn’t allow abortion beyond trimester, that’s how it works in most EU countries. Ok: Vaccine mandates are not cool. Better: Vaccine mandates are not cool, just look at Sweden. Ok: Voting should require IDs. Better: Voting should require IDs, just look at EU. My country has a deep malaise of insecurity and inability to rationally think for itself. We were leading our ideas with basis of good arguments in 1950-1980s, then came all the things we want to idealize about EU. Nothing against EU, they should be promoting independent thought and not copy Americans either. Please don’t make arguments about what specific examples I gave. They may not be accurate but there are many more like this. The point to argue is not about vaccines or whatever, it’s about independent thought and policy.

cpa 4y ago

> How can the same organization be behind this? That's not specific to the EU. When it comes to national governments, each ministry/department often has conflicting goals. So, when digital issues are tackled by the Interior Minister, you get this type of law proposal, but when it's handled by the Digital or Justice Minister, it's (generally) a different story.

vmilner 4y ago

“We decide on something, leave it lying around and wait and see what happens. If no one kicks up a fuss, because most people don't understand what has been decided, we continue step by step until there is no turning back.” - Jean-Claude Juncker 1999