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I am once again happy that the EU is fighting practices like these via legislation. Some outcomes can be annoying, but the net result is still positive, for th
by thih9 11d ago
I am once again happy that the EU is fighting practices like these via legislation.
Some outcomes can be annoying, but the net result is still positive, for the consumers and their data privacy at least.
- surcap526 11d ago[dead]
- Joel_Mckay 11d agoUnfortunately, most LLM companies always were naturally an intelligence operation on civilians, and determining if they are now state-backed seems like a irrelevant detail. Privacy has been dead for some time now. The fact is most business people never figure out how they are exploited. The modern intelligence campaigns just made it economical to hit almost everyone regardless of scale... often under some silly pretense like terrorists wanting our underpants. =3
- bko 11d ago[flagged]
- deleted 11d ago[deleted]
- Avicebron 11d ago> The outcome is that very little serious technology or influential companies come out of Europe. And salaries for things like engineer are about a third of that in the US. So your argument is abusive practices are required for the creation of influential companies, serious technology, and high paying salaries?
- bko 11d agoNo but overly burdensome regulatory bodies that are concerned about such things like how the top of my bottle cap functions and how low i set my ac temp leads to an incredibly hostile business environment and stagnant culture. But like I said, nice place to visit for the time being.
- imawakegnxoxo 11d agoBeats companies and governments being openly hostile towards the people You know, the thing that actually makes a country/society Putting the needs of business over the needs of the people those businesses are actually supposed to serve is how you end up with America
- sailingparrot 11d ago> nice place to visit for the time being. Yes, because it’s a place where culture matters and where trying to change everything as fast as possible for unknown reason and handing out unlimited power to corps to e.g. level half the country to build DCs is not seen as a good outcome. The specific mindset you complain about is what makes those place nice.
- bko 11d ago[flagged]
- mitxela 11d agoYou don't think all industrial countries have stuff like that? Do you really think the European economy is stifled by bottle caps being attached to their bottles by default? Even if it bothers you, it's a really weak attachment, you can just pull it off.
- c-hendricks 11d ago> overly burdensome regulatory bodies that are concerned about such things like ... how low i set my ac temp leads to an incredibly hostile business environment and stagnant culture Like the US of A? Also various stars have introduced more bottle cap regulations. One such state is a hotbed for inflated software developer salaries.
- blauditore 11d agoThe obsession with ACs in some places (or rather people I guess) is something I will never sympathize with. Just wear reasonable clothes for the weather, no need to cool down below 20° C. And yes, I'm going to die on that hill.
- throw10920 11d ago> So your argument is abusive practices are required for the creation of influential companies, serious technology, and high paying salaries? They never said anything remotely like that in their comment. Please engage in good faith, don't lie and pretend that others said things they didn't, and don't break the guidelines.
- deleted 11d ago[deleted]
- josmar 11d agoIf it's any consolation, all other non-California regions in the world lack the privacy protections enjoyed in Switzerland and the EU, but they still don't produce many unicorn startups nor have fantastic salaries for coders.
- phatskat 11d ago> The outcome is that very little serious technology or influential companies come out of Europe. And salaries for things like engineer are about a third of that in the US. Sure, but plenty of companies want to operate within the EU. While I feel any legislation will only affect their operations within the EU, having the infrastructure to operate under privacy laws there means it'll be easier if/when other jurisdictions follow suit
- thih9 11d ago> But I'm happy EU does this stuff as well, as it's a really nice vacation spot With no Flock cameras!
- altern8 11d agoI don't know if the destruction of many industries in the EU--including manufacturing--can be called an annoyance. All the EU bureaucrats can do is regulate, that's why it's so difficult to do business in the EU and that's why there is so little innovation over here. If Microsoft and Apple were started in the EU they would've been shut down within a week because you can't operate from a garage. I guess that every once in a while this might have a positive outcome for consumers, a broken clock is right twice a day.
- schubidubiduba 11d agoI'm sure Microsoft and Apple could have been able to afford a cheap office given their parents' generous financing. And, regarding the original topic, we wouldn't have many of these privacy issues if the US had not strategically failed to regulate its obnoxious tech monopolies
- goobatrooba 11d agoI don't see how that's relevant? Regulation might have limited some innovation in tech, but gdpr does not affect any of the dying industries. That's more from competition with china, companies with too much interest in giving payouts to shareholders than to innovate, and US financial industry buying most of the best players
- techpression 11d agoGDPR is being changed to allow tracking and AI training without consent, EU only protects people if it’s the interest of EU companies, GDPR is now too costly so it has to be dismantled in certain areas. https://www.computerworld.com/article/4087347/european-commission-moves-to-loosen-gdpr-for-ai-and-cookie-tracking.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/4087347/european-commi...
- deleted 11d ago[deleted]
- tene80i 11d agoWhat do you think US bureaucrats do other than regulate? The federal government drives people crazy. Have you ever tried to file taxes in the USA? It’s so complex you end up having to pay for the privilege. The innovation gap is real but it’s not just to do with regulation. It’s a lot to do with concentrated capital networks (eg Silicon Valley). And sure, the tech giants are in the USA but it’s not like there’s no innovation in the EU. Spotify in Sweden. Challenger banks in the U.K. (included as Monzo predates Brexit). And plenty of innovation - they just get bought by US companies. Which is a financial market weakness, not a regulatory one.
- fooker 11d ago> Some outcomes can be annoying I'd classify mandatory encryption backdoors as an industry crisis rather than an annoyance.
- dspillett 11d agoWhich has nothing to do with the stalking of the adtech industry, unless you are suggesting that the EU might sell access to the keys to the likes of OpenAI? [though you are not wrong that encryption backdoors are a backwards step on individuals rights to privacy]
- Llamamoe 11d agoEncryption backdoors by definition mean everybody who wants it gets hands on your data. You can't make backdoors only the "good guys" can access. And while, sure, adtech corpos maybe won't due to the bad PR, what about the Kremlin, criminal organizations, or your insane abusive ex?
- Barbing 11d agoRather tragic that less-technical folks in positions of power can find this: > You can't make backdoors only the "good guys" can access. incomprehensible. I’m sure genuinely so, even.
- Avicebron 11d ago"It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it." -Upton Sinclair
- phatfish 11d agoWhat can the Kremlin do that is worse than the tech bros? Leverage data to deliver people additive divisive content until it all boils over into the "real world" and splits society? Oh wait...
- jampekka 11d ago> I am once again happy that the EU is fighting practices like these via legislation. As long as you manage to navigate all the dark patterns and not accidentally give your "informed consent".
- dspillett 11d agoMalicious compliance (or as it more usually is malicious noncompliance that has not been sufficiently punished so the slimy buggers feel free to continue) is something you should blame the stalkers of adtech for, more than the EU. The legislators could perhaps have made the definitions less wavy, and been harder with enforcement, but that doesn't make it all their fault.
- jampekka 11d agoThese problems were quite widely foreseen during the legislative process, and partly had already been exhibited by the earlier ePrivacy directive. I don't know whether it matters who's to blame, but my trust in EU being very effective in these fights in the future either is not very high.
- soulofmischief 11d agoAre you equally happy that the EU is attempting to mandate backdoors into technological platforms and outlaw private encrypted communication?
- dspillett 11d agoCopypasting my reply to someone who made almost exactly the same point in a sibling comment earlier: Which has nothing to do with the stalking of the adtech industry, unless you are suggesting that the EU might sell access to the keys to the likes of OpenAI [though you are not wrong that encryption backdoors are a backwards step on individuals rights to privacy] Things could be worse. It could be like most of the US where there are both no (or at least far fewer) protections against invasive behaviour of private companies and the government actively trying to backdoor private comms.
- einpoklum 11d ago> Which has nothing to do with the stalking of the adtech industry It has a lot to do with the practices of the adtech industry. If privacy is protected and upheld vis-a-vis the government (or meta-government in case of the EU), it may be upheld vis-a-vis private corporations and other governments. But if the government likes to be able to spy on its citizens, it will not foster mechanisms, practices and a culture of private communications. But - I agree that it could be much worse.
- slig 11d agoAnd the sane world is fighting the EU BS with geo blocking. Just set up your user agent to work as you wish, isn't that simpler than have unelected, technologic dumb bureaucrats writing laws that are complex and don't solve the issue?
- einpoklum 11d agoIs it now? Are Alphabet, Microsoft, Yahoo and Meta's platforms and call-home products illegal for exposure to EU residents? i.e. Google, Bing, Facebook, WhatsApp, MS Office and such? Are these companies' C-suite people wanted, to be charged massive breaches of user privacy?
- ljm 11d agoSeeing some legitimate executive accountability would be lovely in this day and age, but even fines going into the billions of euros are still just the cost of doing business in a ridiculously lucrative space. That they also happen to dominate by oligopoly.
- dmix 11d agoThe adtech/data broker business is still very lively in EU. The last time I read into it a year or two ago the consensus seemed to be the privacy gains over the last decade have been modest at best. There was a few big name trackers that were forced to narrow data collection but the general ad/location tracking and data broker business is still mostly the same. https://arxiv.org/abs/2411.06862 https://arxiv.org/abs/2411.06862 https://netzpolitik.org/2025/databroker-files-targeting-the-eu/ https://netzpolitik.org/2025/databroker-files-targeting-the-...
- buzer 11d agoThere are multiple reasons for it. One of the major issues is that some DPAs pretty refuse to enforce GDPR (e.g. DPC in Ireland). Hopefully the changes to cross-border enforcement that are coming in force next year will help with this as it at least has some deadlines unlike currently. Another issue is that controllers generally do not need to change their behavior before the final lawful decision which can take a lot of time to go through the court system, especially if it needs CJEU referral. And once the decision comes in force they can often make small changes and restart the whole process. Also another issue is that DPAs do not often initiate the investigations themselves (unless breach is involved), they only happen at the request of data subjects and not that many people bother making complaints or follow them up. Just yesterday I had to follow up with 9 page reply to the controller's response to the DPA inquiry. Additionally ePD and GDPR enforcement is sometimes split between different agencies. In those cases GDPR agency tends to wait for ePD case to be solved before investigating the GDPR aspects, often because the ePD consent validity will affects e.g. GDPR legal basis analysis.
- thih9 11d agoPerhaps, perhaps not. Big trackers reducing data collection is a win in my book. OpenAI is not doing ad personalization for the EU customers. There are no Flock cameras. It’s an ongoing fight for sure but it’s some fight at least.
- singularity2001 11d agoDo the big guys sell to the small guys? Like if I'm a shady small company trying to buy as much information as I can about a certain user, will I freely get the data from X and Facebook and Google?