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As someone living in the EU, these kind of things puzzle me a lot. How can a legal system exist, where it's possible to deny a (consumer) contract party access
by Fischgericht 3y ago
As someone living in the EU, these kind of things puzzle me a lot.
How can a legal system exist, where it's possible to deny a (consumer) contract party access to the legal system and law of the land?
(In the EU we do have arbitrations clauses, but they are only legal between businesses and tightly regulated. Arbitration "courts" must be neutral. And you can not put them into ToS.)
Also, I was under the impression that all sane legal systems on this planet are based on the broad principle of "pacta sunt servanda" = "agreements must be kept". One party of a contract never can change the contract without consent from the other party.
We do have the concept of "silent approval" for consumers over here, too, but that only applies to minor changes to terms that are not a "surprising" change to the consumer. It recently was ruled that for example Netflix increasing prices without active consent is not legal in the EU. There is not much that is not regarded as "surprising" by courts here. "You are not allowed to sue us after having lost your personal data, then lying about it" clearly would be regarded as surprising.
Im summary: Every aspect of that whole 23andMe story would be impossible in the EU. The amount of data they collected, the way they stored it, the way they tried to hide the breach, and them trying to prevent their customers to get access to the law.
I wonder how on earth the US legal system could deteriorate so much that such a story becomes possible.
[Disclaimer: I am not bragging about living in the EU. I did not have any influence on my place of birth. I do not wish to imply that the EU is "superior" to the US. I am just trying to give an outside perspective.]
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- pyuser583 3y agoThe real issue is that lawyer can “try” anything with almost no consequences. I doubt this will work. But there’s “no harm in trying.”
- Fischgericht 3y agoOver here there are "consumer associations" that have the right to sue in such cases in the name of all consumers. That works quite well. Due to this traditionally those things are not even tried. That has changed with (mostly US) businesses entering the EU. A good example is booking.com, who again and again and again invented new dark patterns to then get sued for it, making it clear those are illegal. We had the same with the airline industry with their advertised prices not matching the actual final price with all taxes and made-up fees. But by now even Ryanair has given up and no longer tries those tactics. But there are no big financial penalties for losing such cases in court. I guess it's the bad PR these court cases generate every time that makes those businesses after a while giving up trying to screw over consumers...
- pyuser583 3y agoIn the US we have class actions (groups of aggrieved consumers). And States Attorney Generals who sue on behalf of the public. The problem is most lawsuits end in plea deals, so it matters greatly who the specific litigants are, as they have to ability to agree to a compromise that affects everybody. That’s why many conservatives (and only slightly fewer liberals) are “standing hawks” - people who think only folks with very specific harms should be part of lawsuit.
- denton-scratch 3y ago> I wonder how on earth the US legal system could deteriorate so much that such a story becomes possible. My impression is that everything in the USA has become lawyerized. Politicians are all lawyers. If you have assets of more than a mill, you have a legal team. You can't move for lawyers. I'm watching stories about a man facing 90 charges, who is still running for president (and has a good chance of winning). All of his co-accused are lawyers. Youd think that, with so many lawyers around, it should be really quick to get justice. But it's the opposite; apparently, the more lawyers are involved, the longer justice is delayed.