5 ms·

Why are people shocked everytime they discover that the law applies to companies and companies comply with it?

carlosjobim 2y ago
Thank you for supporting the government, please collect 5 credits at your nearest citizen service centre.
Nextgrid 2y ago
Companies only comply with laws that are _enforced_ and/or where compliance doesn't cost them anything. Laws whose enforcement is lacking or compliance would be against their business model are routinely ignored. See the GDPR as an example.
- blitzar 2y ago
  > where compliance doesn't cost them anything Compliance officers make lots of money, lawyers make lots of money.
  - close04 2y ago
    Breaking the law can also make you a lot of money. OP probably refers to "the cost of doing business", with the implication that sometimes breaking the law and paying all the associated costs (compliance officers, lawyers, lawsuits, and fines) still amounts to less than the profit made from breaking that law.
- dotancohen 2y ago
  Which business, specifically, do you feel is not complying with the GDPR?
  - close04 2y ago
    I find it very hard to assume good faith behind the question. GDPR certainly made things better but it's by no means a cure all because enforcement is slow and relatively weak. You can take https://noyb.eu https://noyb.eu as a very good resource for this. Some excerpts: > Microsoft's Xandr grants GDPR rights at a rate of 0% > Norwegian court confirms € 5.7 million fine for Grindr > Meta ignores the users’ right to easily withdraw consent > Streaming service DAZN took almost five years to answer a simple access request > First major fine (€ 1 million) for using Google Analytics > Spotify fined € 5 Million for GDPR violation > € 1.2 billion fine against Meta over EU-US data transfers
- hulitu 2y ago
  You forgot the part where corporations bribe^W lobby the government to make those laws.
UncleSlacky 2y ago
And they'll say that it's only bad when China does it.
- mdhb 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - number6 2y ago
    Considered illegitimate by whom? Chinese citizens might find the requests from the Chinese government legitimate. On the other hand, citizens of the EU might find requests from the US government illegitimate. US national security is far less a legitimate reason if you are not a citizen of the US.
    - mdhb 2y ago
      We are talking about the US context here specifically and the legal process they have set up in place to ensure the rights of their citizens are balanced appropriately against the country’s national security concerns. If you’re making a larger point that espionage is a thing however that’s a very different conversation and not a particularly fruitful one I don’t think. In the same way that all people across the world are potential targets of collection from any group who has the capability to do so. At that point we are just back to the exact same set of arguments that apply to online advertising for example. There are things in there to be pissed about no doubt but it’s a lot more nuanced than that too.
  - usrnm 2y ago
    Actually, we know for a fact that the US 3-letter agencies routinely engage in illegal activities and perform illegitimate searches even on their own citizens, let alone the rest of the world. It's been 11 years since Snowden leaks, it's insane how many people seem to pretend that it never happened
  - ThunderSizzle 2y ago
    We have investigated ourselves and found ourselves almost entirely perfect. Meanwhile, Google just heavily obfuscated news on Trump’s assassination attempt, including many of the reports on the Congressional hearings.
krapp 2y ago
There seems to be a weird quasi-anarchist/libertarian streak in tech and SV culture that expects tech companies to be somehow anti-statist and willing to defy the government on principles these companies simply do not have. Maybe it's because for capitalist reasons these companies skirt regulations when they can get away with it? Maybe because they use F/OSS software, and people assume that means they embrace the culture? I don't know why. A lot of people still seem to think Google's "don't be evil" means they're eternally and existentially committed to some standard of moral and ethical purity that even most radical idealists don't meet, or that any tech company having any communication with the government is implicitly nefarious. Even 4chan complies with law enforcement when they have a valid warrant. No one is going to take a bullet for you or your data.
- CPLX 2y ago
  Reading the book Palo Alto was a serious eye-opener into how SV culture came to be the way that it is. Let's just say this goes way, way back. https://www.amazon.com/Palo-Alto-History-California-Capitalism/dp/031659203X https://www.amazon.com/Palo-Alto-History-California-Capitali...
_heimdall 2y ago
I think people's shock is usually not knowing what laws and executive branch regulations exist rather than realizing companies will comply with laws.
account42 2y ago
Why are you shocked to find out people are oblivious to the implications of giving US megacorporations their data when those people willingly continue to give those corporations even more and more of their data?
- muwtyhg 2y ago
  "Give" is a strong word for a company whose main product is surveilling their customers to show them ads. I'm not sure how much you can avoid "giving" Google your personal information at this point without deep knowledge of the various ways they attempt to track you (and you'll probably still fail to avoid them).
  - hulitu 2y ago
    Only regular people steal. Users agree with the terms of service. /s
teqsun 2y ago
If people don't have an uproar every time they're reminded, it normalizes and legitimizes it. The outrage forces them to operate it in the shadows. As much as I hate it happening on any level, I feel that the forced secrecy must have some cooling effect on if not the collection, but at least the use and application of it.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
rigonkulous 2y ago
People are shocked by laws which abrogate and abuse their human rights, because people do not realize that their human rights depend on constant, vigilant awareness of what the government is doing with the super-powers granted them by the general population. Whenever events such as this occur - and this admission from Google is but one in a long line of shit-pearls - folks get uppity about it, because fundamentally we should all be paying better attention in the first place, and nothing upsets peoples' sensibilities more to find out that their rights are being abrogated, than the understanding that, its happening because we are allowing human rights to be abrogated at massive scale as a course of state policy. What we do to our enemies, we do to ourselves. Where once, Americans - and American culture, and American companies - were absolutely repulsed by the notion of stasi-like, draconian data-reporting policies - they are now, instead, motivated by the extreme power such activities can provide. Sure, it sucks that the government now has a way of identifying its internal enemies - but the fact is, the corporations have had that power, every minute of the day, for decades, also. This is a problem because the government is just the tip of the shit-iceberg, and not many of us have stomach for what it takes to fix the problem.
- beaglesss 2y ago
  The highest, unelectable, courts allow and encourage this behavior. The police are unelected standing army that carry it out. It's a difficult problem that maybe by the most generous interpretation can be voted out, but not really. Only way I see an end is emigration or the US not existing in anything resembling what we see today.
- t-3 2y ago
  > people do not realize that their human rights depend on constant, vigilant awareness of what the government is doing with the super-powers granted them by the general population. Literally every grade school history and civics class I took pounded this idea ad infinitum. I think people by-and-large just don't care because they're probably not being visibly effected even if they feel uncomfortable when it's talked about.
  - rigonkulous 2y ago
nxicvyvy 2y ago
You're confusing anger with shock.

Thank you for supporting the government, please collect 5 credits at your nearest citizen service centre.

Companies only comply with laws that are _enforced_ and/or where compliance doesn't cost them anything. Laws whose enforcement is lacking or compliance would be against their business model are routinely ignored. See the GDPR as an example.

blitzar 2y ago
> where compliance doesn't cost them anything Compliance officers make lots of money, lawyers make lots of money.
- close04 2y ago
  Breaking the law can also make you a lot of money. OP probably refers to "the cost of doing business", with the implication that sometimes breaking the law and paying all the associated costs (compliance officers, lawyers, lawsuits, and fines) still amounts to less than the profit made from breaking that law.
dotancohen 2y ago
Which business, specifically, do you feel is not complying with the GDPR?
- close04 2y ago
  I find it very hard to assume good faith behind the question. GDPR certainly made things better but it's by no means a cure all because enforcement is slow and relatively weak. You can take https://noyb.eu https://noyb.eu as a very good resource for this. Some excerpts: > Microsoft's Xandr grants GDPR rights at a rate of 0% > Norwegian court confirms € 5.7 million fine for Grindr > Meta ignores the users’ right to easily withdraw consent > Streaming service DAZN took almost five years to answer a simple access request > First major fine (€ 1 million) for using Google Analytics > Spotify fined € 5 Million for GDPR violation > € 1.2 billion fine against Meta over EU-US data transfers
hulitu 2y ago
You forgot the part where corporations bribe^W lobby the government to make those laws.

UncleSlacky 2y ago

And they'll say that it's only bad when China does it.

mdhb 2y ago
[flagged]
- number6 2y ago
  Considered illegitimate by whom? Chinese citizens might find the requests from the Chinese government legitimate. On the other hand, citizens of the EU might find requests from the US government illegitimate. US national security is far less a legitimate reason if you are not a citizen of the US.
  - mdhb 2y ago
    We are talking about the US context here specifically and the legal process they have set up in place to ensure the rights of their citizens are balanced appropriately against the country’s national security concerns. If you’re making a larger point that espionage is a thing however that’s a very different conversation and not a particularly fruitful one I don’t think. In the same way that all people across the world are potential targets of collection from any group who has the capability to do so. At that point we are just back to the exact same set of arguments that apply to online advertising for example. There are things in there to be pissed about no doubt but it’s a lot more nuanced than that too.
- usrnm 2y ago
  Actually, we know for a fact that the US 3-letter agencies routinely engage in illegal activities and perform illegitimate searches even on their own citizens, let alone the rest of the world. It's been 11 years since Snowden leaks, it's insane how many people seem to pretend that it never happened
- ThunderSizzle 2y ago
  We have investigated ourselves and found ourselves almost entirely perfect. Meanwhile, Google just heavily obfuscated news on Trump’s assassination attempt, including many of the reports on the Congressional hearings.

krapp 2y ago

There seems to be a weird quasi-anarchist/libertarian streak in tech and SV culture that expects tech companies to be somehow anti-statist and willing to defy the government on principles these companies simply do not have. Maybe it's because for capitalist reasons these companies skirt regulations when they can get away with it? Maybe because they use F/OSS software, and people assume that means they embrace the culture? I don't know why. A lot of people still seem to think Google's "don't be evil" means they're eternally and existentially committed to some standard of moral and ethical purity that even most radical idealists don't meet, or that any tech company having any communication with the government is implicitly nefarious. Even 4chan complies with law enforcement when they have a valid warrant. No one is going to take a bullet for you or your data.

CPLX 2y ago
Reading the book Palo Alto was a serious eye-opener into how SV culture came to be the way that it is. Let's just say this goes way, way back. https://www.amazon.com/Palo-Alto-History-California-Capitalism/dp/031659203X https://www.amazon.com/Palo-Alto-History-California-Capitali...

_heimdall 2y ago

I think people's shock is usually not knowing what laws and executive branch regulations exist rather than realizing companies will comply with laws.

account42 2y ago

Why are you shocked to find out people are oblivious to the implications of giving US megacorporations their data when those people willingly continue to give those corporations even more and more of their data?

muwtyhg 2y ago
"Give" is a strong word for a company whose main product is surveilling their customers to show them ads. I'm not sure how much you can avoid "giving" Google your personal information at this point without deep knowledge of the various ways they attempt to track you (and you'll probably still fail to avoid them).
- hulitu 2y ago
  Only regular people steal. Users agree with the terms of service. /s

teqsun 2y ago

If people don't have an uproar every time they're reminded, it normalizes and legitimizes it. The outrage forces them to operate it in the shadows. As much as I hate it happening on any level, I feel that the forced secrecy must have some cooling effect on if not the collection, but at least the use and application of it.

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

rigonkulous 2y ago

People are shocked by laws which abrogate and abuse their human rights, because people do not realize that their human rights depend on constant, vigilant awareness of what the government is doing with the super-powers granted them by the general population. Whenever events such as this occur - and this admission from Google is but one in a long line of shit-pearls - folks get uppity about it, because fundamentally we should all be paying better attention in the first place, and nothing upsets peoples' sensibilities more to find out that their rights are being abrogated, than the understanding that, its happening because we are allowing human rights to be abrogated at massive scale as a course of state policy. What we do to our enemies, we do to ourselves. Where once, Americans - and American culture, and American companies - were absolutely repulsed by the notion of stasi-like, draconian data-reporting policies - they are now, instead, motivated by the extreme power such activities can provide. Sure, it sucks that the government now has a way of identifying its internal enemies - but the fact is, the corporations have had that power, every minute of the day, for decades, also. This is a problem because the government is just the tip of the shit-iceberg, and not many of us have stomach for what it takes to fix the problem.

beaglesss 2y ago
The highest, unelectable, courts allow and encourage this behavior. The police are unelected standing army that carry it out. It's a difficult problem that maybe by the most generous interpretation can be voted out, but not really. Only way I see an end is emigration or the US not existing in anything resembling what we see today.
t-3 2y ago
> people do not realize that their human rights depend on constant, vigilant awareness of what the government is doing with the super-powers granted them by the general population. Literally every grade school history and civics class I took pounded this idea ad infinitum. I think people by-and-large just don't care because they're probably not being visibly effected even if they feel uncomfortable when it's talked about.
- rigonkulous 2y ago

nxicvyvy 2y ago

You're confusing anger with shock.