6 ms·

How can a government have jurisdiction over this? It's their system. If they decide to only give you an account on their system if you've verified your name (i.

How can a government have jurisdiction over this? It's their system. If they decide to only give you an account on their system if you've verified your name (i.e. through driver's license) then why can you demand otherwise? They can just refuse you service, can't they?

nugget 11y ago
For better or for worse, once services become monopolies the government has much more authority to regulate them.
- dylanjermiah 11y ago
  Facebook is not monopoly. The real definition of a monopoly is the sole provider of a good or service, which has apparently been forgotten. FB is not the only social network, nor will it ever be. Who does have the ability to use force to create artificial monopolies though?
creshal 11y ago
It's not fully clear whether the German government has jurisdiction here, with Facebook nominally residing in Ireland. A case has just been filed by the Hamburg state government, but that can easily take years to go through courts. > How can a government have jurisdiction over this? Because the government can decide that demanding a driver's license is illegal because it is an unreasonable burden on users, simple as that. German law states it must be possible to use a service anonymously or pseudonymously "if it is technically possible and reasonable". Whether it is reasonable in this particular case is for the courts to decide. (cf. Telemediengesetz, http://www.cgerli.org/index.php?id=51&tx_vmdocumentsearch_pi2[docID]=1438 http://www.cgerli.org/index.php?id=51&tx_vmdocumentsearch_pi... )
- personjerry 11y ago
  That makes sense, thank you for explaining the particular details.
- _ak 11y ago
  Facebook is operating in Germany, among other countries. If they want to earn money in Germany, they need to obey to German laws and regulations, obviously.
  - creshal 11y ago
    With the internet being the poorly regulated series of tubes it is, they argue they're operating and earning money solely in Ireland, not Germany. Whether the judge will be amused by this, we'll see.
    - _ak 11y ago
      They operate offices in Hamburg and Berlin. They specifically target German advertisers. They won't be that stupid to even attempt that argument.
      - pjc50 11y ago
        They already have argued that the datacentre is in Ireland and therefore not subject to this ruling. Again, we await a jurisdiction ruling.
      - creshal 11y ago
        They did – publicly, at least. We'll see what they argue in court.
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
- mseebach 11y ago
  They can decide all that, but that doesn't give them clear jurisdiction to actually enforce it. They can penalise users doing it, possibly by making it a breach of the terms of carrying a drivers license to use it for this purpose, although it's not clear how they'd prove such usage. Alternatively, they can try to hit Facebook's ad sales in Germany, but that's likely to run into common market rules around trade barriers. Anyway, does Facebook actually enforce this? I have never shown any ID to Facebook, and I see plenty of people not using their real names (typically they use derivatives or add a screenname as a middle name, rather than being totally pseudonymous).
  - pjc50 11y ago
    They can issue a court order, and if Facebook were to go full "freemen of the land" and try to ignore it there's always the European Arrest Warrant.
  - Broken_Hippo 11y ago
    "Does facebook actually enforce this?" .... The answer to this question is a loud "yes". The harderst hit groups I've found are transgender folks and occultists. As far as being pagan/occultist, many prefer to keep a seperate account for their religious lives, partially because many live in places where they would be persecuted. In addition, many have a magical name that is part of their chosen religion, that they prefer to be addressed by in such circles. The result of the real name policy, outside of taking away individual privacy, has been the shutting down of accounts, forcing people to provide identifacation, phone numbers, etc, to prove you are you, and insisting that the name matches the legal name. Some people never really seem to be able to unlock the original account (or don't want to give facebook ID)
  - Symbiote 11y ago
    Facebook completely enforces this, but only acts on profiles that are reported to them. Around a year ago, many of my friends were in a "Gay Pride 2014 parade" group. Over two or three days, everyone in that group with a fake-looking name was reported. A little later, everyone who had 'liked' a local gay nightclub page was reported. The obvious conclusion was someone with an agenda was searching particular groups for people to report.
- DanBC 11y ago
  > It's not fully clear whether the German government has jurisdiction here, with Facebook nominally residing in Ireland. Facebook has offices in London and Hamburg so "operating out of Ireland" is a bit of a stretch that seems to work with tax authorities, but may not work with other law enforcement.
- rbehrends 11y ago
  > It's not fully clear whether the German government has jurisdiction here, with Facebook nominally residing in Ireland. The Schleswig-Holstein data protection authority lost a case against Facebook in 2013 because the court ruled that Germany didn't have jurisdiction. However, the Google Spain case last year changed that pretty decisively. It's difficult to see (after Google lost before the CJEU) why Germany should not have jurisdiction in this case.
return0 11y ago
Not when politicians and governments use it. Facebook and twitter are utilities now.
- philippnagel 11y ago
  Going with that logic, everything these entities use becomes a utility.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
madez 11y ago
How can a government have jurisdiction over this? By the existence of a law proclaiming so. Also, in this case it was not the government but another organ of the state, unless you refer with ´government´ to any organization of public law. In many jurisdiction there are restrictions and rules for businesses in place. For example, often you can't restrict purchases of your product based on the customers skin colour. In Germany privacy is fundamentally more valued and protected than in the US of central-north America. For example, under german law you have the right to get virtually all information a organization is keeping about you, why they are keeping it, where it is from, how they use it and who they share it with. The organization is obligued to comply without financial compensation [1]. Furthermore, there are broad cases where the deletion of the stored information can be demanded [2]. Information about people may not be stored without the technical necessity for the service or without the explicit consent from the affected persons. As soon as the consent is withdrawn or the data is not any more needed to offer the service, it must be deleted. Facebook collects and keeps data about people who do not have an active account. That is not allowed in Germany. To put it blunt; in its current form, Facebooks practices are illegal under german law. Germans don't want anybody to collect data about them, and made laws against it. Ironically, they still use Google. I guess most simply don't understand the implications or don't see practical alternatives. I hope this elaboration makes the situation more understandable. [1] http://dejure.org/gesetze/BDSG/34.html http://dejure.org/gesetze/BDSG/34.html [2] http://dejure.org/gesetze/BDSG/35.html http://dejure.org/gesetze/BDSG/35.html
- icebraining 11y ago
  As a side note, those data protection laws are widespread across the EU, thanks to Directive 95/46/EC.
  - madez 11y ago
    Thank you for this information. Indeed, in Section II, Article 7 rules are laid down [1] which Facebook is violating, for example with shadowprofiles. [1] http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:31995L0046:EN:HTML http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:...
- 11y ago
detaro 11y ago
If you offer information services in Germany you have to allow pseudonymous access if it is reasonable to do so, as part of privacy rules (principle of "Datensparsamkeit" = "data economicalness" - requiring as few pieces of information as absolutely necessary). It is an interesting question if Facebook requires your real name to function properly and if this decision would hold in court, but it is in principle covered by law and I imagine the fact that facebook and other social networks have worked without these rules before might work against facebook here.
JulianMorrison 11y ago
They can't "out" you. Because privacy. IMO this ought to be a global rule. It's completely unacceptable to have a private company arrogating to itself the ability to "out" you at its convenience. Fuck contracts. It's wrong.
- dempseye 11y ago
  [insert angry libertarian response]
- mseebach 11y ago
  Who's talking about outing anyone? Denying service to pseudonymous users isn't outing anyone. Just don't give Facebook your real name, then they can't tell anyone your real name. They might deny you service, but they can't 'out' you.
  - pjc50 11y ago
    Just don't give Facebook your real name As with Linkedin, that's not sufficient. Other people can tell them your name.
  - EwanToo 11y ago
    Any one of 100s (1000s?) of people can give them your real name by storing it in their address book alongside your Facebook profile.
pjc50 11y ago
Their system is subject to EU data protection and privacy law. They probably could actually just refuse her service, that would be a different case. Although if they started banning transgender people, or foreigners with strange names, on that basis it would collide with equalities law. And it sounds like German privacy law prevents requesting identity documents (which are, after all, government issue) when not actually required for fraud prevention. Theoretically US law has a similar rule about social security numbers but it's not well enforced.
- spacecowboy_lon 11y ago
  A while back the UK clamped down on misuse of NI (the equivalent for ss numbers). I was working for BT at the time and the briefing we got on use of NI numbers was very clear that break these rules and your ass is fired - it was stronger worded than the don't look up the queens private telephone numbers one we had.
davidgerard 11y ago
If they do business in Germany, e.g. selling ads, they get to obey local law.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
sillygeese 11y ago
> How can a government have jurisdiction over this? Or more broadly, how can a government have jurisdiction over anything, or anyone? The answer is fundamentally: by force. For example, if I point a gun at you, I've just established the same kind of "jurisdiction" over your wallet. Because otherwise you'd just refrain from giving it to me. But isn't it great that a "privacy watchdog" is limiting the privacy invasions Facebook can inflict on us, while surveilling us themselves, and funding their operations with money that's forcefully taken from us? It's like, heart-warming! (They've established "jurisdiction" over our incomes!)
- jon-wood 11y ago
  You talk like these organisations are one coherent whole having meetings to plot how to best exploit German citizens. It's entirely possible, and probably desirable, to have a government containing on group trying to protect citizen's privacy while another has reasons not to - where those roles overlap you should at least in theory have debate within government as to who takes precedence. In this non-ideal world that may not happen, but its better than not even making that possible.
  - sillygeese 11y ago
    Do you think that's a satisfactory situation though? Suppose that there actually is a group within the government that's genuinely trying to protect us. Even so, the organization they'd be protecting us from is the exact same one they're part of. How does that make sense? It's like there's a pack of wolves next to a herd of sheep, and one of the wolves is like: "Guys? Guyyys? Can we just not eat them please?" In reality, governments are hell-bent on monitoring everything we do, because that's a great way to cement their power over us. Dictators don't arrange elections, and the most productive slave is one who thinks he's free. That's a large part of why the whole world isn't under complete tyranny right now. Try protesting anything any government does though, and the response will be tear gas and batons. That shows exactly how many fucks they give about our well-being or wishes. (Recent examples: Hong Kong, Brazil, Venezuela etc)
- Oletros 11y ago
MereInterest 11y ago
Why wouldn't a government have jurisdiction here? A government exists to protect, enforce, and guarantee the rights of the individual. If, in one country, the people have decided that those rights include the right to privacy, then of course the government can require that any businesses operating there will respect those rights. It's their country, not Facebook's.
- dylanjermiah 11y ago
  If an individual desires privacy, perhaps being on Facebook is not wise.
GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
The modern corporation only exists because of the jurisdiction of governments.

nugget 11y ago

For better or for worse, once services become monopolies the government has much more authority to regulate them.

dylanjermiah 11y ago
Facebook is not monopoly. The real definition of a monopoly is the sole provider of a good or service, which has apparently been forgotten. FB is not the only social network, nor will it ever be. Who does have the ability to use force to create artificial monopolies though?

creshal 11y ago

It's not fully clear whether the German government has jurisdiction here, with Facebook nominally residing in Ireland. A case has just been filed by the Hamburg state government, but that can easily take years to go through courts. > How can a government have jurisdiction over this? Because the government can decide that demanding a driver's license is illegal because it is an unreasonable burden on users, simple as that. German law states it must be possible to use a service anonymously or pseudonymously "if it is technically possible and reasonable". Whether it is reasonable in this particular case is for the courts to decide. (cf. Telemediengesetz, http://www.cgerli.org/index.php?id=51&tx_vmdocumentsearch_pi2[docID]=1438 http://www.cgerli.org/index.php?id=51&tx_vmdocumentsearch_pi... )

personjerry 11y ago
That makes sense, thank you for explaining the particular details.
_ak 11y ago
Facebook is operating in Germany, among other countries. If they want to earn money in Germany, they need to obey to German laws and regulations, obviously.
- creshal 11y ago
  With the internet being the poorly regulated series of tubes it is, they argue they're operating and earning money solely in Ireland, not Germany. Whether the judge will be amused by this, we'll see.
  - _ak 11y ago
    They operate offices in Hamburg and Berlin. They specifically target German advertisers. They won't be that stupid to even attempt that argument.
    - pjc50 11y ago
      They already have argued that the datacentre is in Ireland and therefore not subject to this ruling. Again, we await a jurisdiction ruling.
    - creshal 11y ago
      They did – publicly, at least. We'll see what they argue in court.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
mseebach 11y ago
They can decide all that, but that doesn't give them clear jurisdiction to actually enforce it. They can penalise users doing it, possibly by making it a breach of the terms of carrying a drivers license to use it for this purpose, although it's not clear how they'd prove such usage. Alternatively, they can try to hit Facebook's ad sales in Germany, but that's likely to run into common market rules around trade barriers. Anyway, does Facebook actually enforce this? I have never shown any ID to Facebook, and I see plenty of people not using their real names (typically they use derivatives or add a screenname as a middle name, rather than being totally pseudonymous).
- pjc50 11y ago
  They can issue a court order, and if Facebook were to go full "freemen of the land" and try to ignore it there's always the European Arrest Warrant.
- Broken_Hippo 11y ago
  "Does facebook actually enforce this?" .... The answer to this question is a loud "yes". The harderst hit groups I've found are transgender folks and occultists. As far as being pagan/occultist, many prefer to keep a seperate account for their religious lives, partially because many live in places where they would be persecuted. In addition, many have a magical name that is part of their chosen religion, that they prefer to be addressed by in such circles. The result of the real name policy, outside of taking away individual privacy, has been the shutting down of accounts, forcing people to provide identifacation, phone numbers, etc, to prove you are you, and insisting that the name matches the legal name. Some people never really seem to be able to unlock the original account (or don't want to give facebook ID)
- Symbiote 11y ago
  Facebook completely enforces this, but only acts on profiles that are reported to them. Around a year ago, many of my friends were in a "Gay Pride 2014 parade" group. Over two or three days, everyone in that group with a fake-looking name was reported. A little later, everyone who had 'liked' a local gay nightclub page was reported. The obvious conclusion was someone with an agenda was searching particular groups for people to report.
DanBC 11y ago
> It's not fully clear whether the German government has jurisdiction here, with Facebook nominally residing in Ireland. Facebook has offices in London and Hamburg so "operating out of Ireland" is a bit of a stretch that seems to work with tax authorities, but may not work with other law enforcement.
rbehrends 11y ago
> It's not fully clear whether the German government has jurisdiction here, with Facebook nominally residing in Ireland. The Schleswig-Holstein data protection authority lost a case against Facebook in 2013 because the court ruled that Germany didn't have jurisdiction. However, the Google Spain case last year changed that pretty decisively. It's difficult to see (after Google lost before the CJEU) why Germany should not have jurisdiction in this case.

return0 11y ago

Not when politicians and governments use it. Facebook and twitter are utilities now.

philippnagel 11y ago
Going with that logic, everything these entities use becomes a utility.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]

madez 11y ago

How can a government have jurisdiction over this? By the existence of a law proclaiming so. Also, in this case it was not the government but another organ of the state, unless you refer with ´government´ to any organization of public law. In many jurisdiction there are restrictions and rules for businesses in place. For example, often you can't restrict purchases of your product based on the customers skin colour. In Germany privacy is fundamentally more valued and protected than in the US of central-north America. For example, under german law you have the right to get virtually all information a organization is keeping about you, why they are keeping it, where it is from, how they use it and who they share it with. The organization is obligued to comply without financial compensation [1]. Furthermore, there are broad cases where the deletion of the stored information can be demanded [2]. Information about people may not be stored without the technical necessity for the service or without the explicit consent from the affected persons. As soon as the consent is withdrawn or the data is not any more needed to offer the service, it must be deleted. Facebook collects and keeps data about people who do not have an active account. That is not allowed in Germany. To put it blunt; in its current form, Facebooks practices are illegal under german law. Germans don't want anybody to collect data about them, and made laws against it. Ironically, they still use Google. I guess most simply don't understand the implications or don't see practical alternatives. I hope this elaboration makes the situation more understandable. [1] http://dejure.org/gesetze/BDSG/34.html http://dejure.org/gesetze/BDSG/34.html [2] http://dejure.org/gesetze/BDSG/35.html http://dejure.org/gesetze/BDSG/35.html

icebraining 11y ago
As a side note, those data protection laws are widespread across the EU, thanks to Directive 95/46/EC.
- madez 11y ago
  Thank you for this information. Indeed, in Section II, Article 7 rules are laid down [1] which Facebook is violating, for example with shadowprofiles. [1] http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:31995L0046:EN:HTML http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:...
11y ago

detaro 11y ago

If you offer information services in Germany you have to allow pseudonymous access if it is reasonable to do so, as part of privacy rules (principle of "Datensparsamkeit" = "data economicalness" - requiring as few pieces of information as absolutely necessary). It is an interesting question if Facebook requires your real name to function properly and if this decision would hold in court, but it is in principle covered by law and I imagine the fact that facebook and other social networks have worked without these rules before might work against facebook here.

JulianMorrison 11y ago

They can't "out" you. Because privacy. IMO this ought to be a global rule. It's completely unacceptable to have a private company arrogating to itself the ability to "out" you at its convenience. Fuck contracts. It's wrong.

dempseye 11y ago
[insert angry libertarian response]
mseebach 11y ago
Who's talking about outing anyone? Denying service to pseudonymous users isn't outing anyone. Just don't give Facebook your real name, then they can't tell anyone your real name. They might deny you service, but they can't 'out' you.
- pjc50 11y ago
  Just don't give Facebook your real name As with Linkedin, that's not sufficient. Other people can tell them your name.
- EwanToo 11y ago
  Any one of 100s (1000s?) of people can give them your real name by storing it in their address book alongside your Facebook profile.

pjc50 11y ago

Their system is subject to EU data protection and privacy law. They probably could actually just refuse her service, that would be a different case. Although if they started banning transgender people, or foreigners with strange names, on that basis it would collide with equalities law. And it sounds like German privacy law prevents requesting identity documents (which are, after all, government issue) when not actually required for fraud prevention. Theoretically US law has a similar rule about social security numbers but it's not well enforced.

spacecowboy_lon 11y ago
A while back the UK clamped down on misuse of NI (the equivalent for ss numbers). I was working for BT at the time and the briefing we got on use of NI numbers was very clear that break these rules and your ass is fired - it was stronger worded than the don't look up the queens private telephone numbers one we had.

davidgerard 11y ago

If they do business in Germany, e.g. selling ads, they get to obey local law.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

sillygeese 11y ago

> How can a government have jurisdiction over this? Or more broadly, how can a government have jurisdiction over anything, or anyone? The answer is fundamentally: by force. For example, if I point a gun at you, I've just established the same kind of "jurisdiction" over your wallet. Because otherwise you'd just refrain from giving it to me. But isn't it great that a "privacy watchdog" is limiting the privacy invasions Facebook can inflict on us, while surveilling us themselves, and funding their operations with money that's forcefully taken from us? It's like, heart-warming! (They've established "jurisdiction" over our incomes!)

jon-wood 11y ago
You talk like these organisations are one coherent whole having meetings to plot how to best exploit German citizens. It's entirely possible, and probably desirable, to have a government containing on group trying to protect citizen's privacy while another has reasons not to - where those roles overlap you should at least in theory have debate within government as to who takes precedence. In this non-ideal world that may not happen, but its better than not even making that possible.
- sillygeese 11y ago
  Do you think that's a satisfactory situation though? Suppose that there actually is a group within the government that's genuinely trying to protect us. Even so, the organization they'd be protecting us from is the exact same one they're part of. How does that make sense? It's like there's a pack of wolves next to a herd of sheep, and one of the wolves is like: "Guys? Guyyys? Can we just not eat them please?" In reality, governments are hell-bent on monitoring everything we do, because that's a great way to cement their power over us. Dictators don't arrange elections, and the most productive slave is one who thinks he's free. That's a large part of why the whole world isn't under complete tyranny right now. Try protesting anything any government does though, and the response will be tear gas and batons. That shows exactly how many fucks they give about our well-being or wishes. (Recent examples: Hong Kong, Brazil, Venezuela etc)
Oletros 11y ago

MereInterest 11y ago

Why wouldn't a government have jurisdiction here? A government exists to protect, enforce, and guarantee the rights of the individual. If, in one country, the people have decided that those rights include the right to privacy, then of course the government can require that any businesses operating there will respect those rights. It's their country, not Facebook's.

dylanjermiah 11y ago
If an individual desires privacy, perhaps being on Facebook is not wise.

GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago

The modern corporation only exists because of the jurisdiction of governments.