Google Analytics May Be Illegal In Germany

sopssa sends in a TechCrunch story that begins "Several federal and regional government officials in Germany are trying to put a ban on Google Analytics, the search giant's free software product that allows website owners and publishers to get detailed statistics about the number, whereabouts, and search behavior of their visitors (and much more)." Here's Google's translation of the article from Zeit Online (original in German). A German lawyer cited there says that penalties for websites that uses Google Analytics could amount to €50,000 (about $75,000). Reader sopssa adds, "The amount of data Google collects from everywhere on the Internet is indeed huge, and website owners should be using a local open source alternative to keep visitor data private."

Comments

Ridiculous.

[MikeFM]

If you come to my website then I, or my designated party, have the right to record the fact that you came to my website. If you don't like it then don't use the web. Is it also against the law to record what customers come in the door of your brick and mortar store in Germany?

Re:Ridiculous.

[darthwader]

It's not quite as cut-and-dry as you think.

It could very well be illegal to follow you around the store and record every product you looked at, and then follow you around the library and see every book you look at (and then examine the records to see what you have ever checked out), then followed you to the video store and measured exactly how much time you spent looking at each title (and also examine your rental history).

The Germans lived through both the Nazis and with the KGB. They have a good reason to be sensitive about protecting people's privacy.

Complete nonsense.

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear Sir or Madam,
this is acutally complete nonsense.
If you choose to publish, you have no right whatsoever to track who is reading your publication for what reason.

Re:Schadenfreude

[rrohbeck]

Except saying bad words on TV or being naked in public :)

Re:Blocked with NoScript

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, NoScript only does part of the job, google-analytics.com, coremetrics.com, any many other ad/tracking entities sneak around NoScript on many sites, including /.

Fortunately, they don't sneak around a HOSTS file very easily. (I suppose they could replace themselves with their own IP addresses, but that defeats the purpose of DNS, and would render them visually indistinguishable from malware. Which, in a sense, they are...)

Re:Not local

[maxwell demon]

If it's a German business, it's bound by German law. Having the webhosting in the U.S. won't help in that case.

Re:Schadenfreude

[stirz]

Fortunately, "The country that tried to take over the world" has ceased to exist in May 1945. So what are you talking about?

Re:Not local

[bickerdyke]

It's like *telling Big Brother* that a middle-aged white male in a red sweatshirt came in the door of your house.

No, it's like telling a guy at a marketing company that a middle-aged white male in a red sweatshirt came in the door of your business.
A marketing company that is paying you or has some type of agreement with you to supply such information.

No. Google tracking cookies are unique to a single browser profile. Thats usually even a single user account.

So it's like letting "big brother" now, that the SAME person that used his credit card, issued to "Henry Johnson, Whatever Rd 34 (full adress)" at Walmart 2 hours ago, and who watched "Nuns with leather & whips" porn site 2 days ago, just came in the door of your house. Oh and yes, he's wearing a red sweatshirt.

Re:Schadenfreude

[kju]

Sorry, disregard my other posting, something went wrong.

I've said it once and I'll say it again: Germany is not a free country.

I'm german and i actually feel that i'm in a very free country, thank you very much. Yes, there are some laws which i disagree with, but overall it is fine.

and then you can't say anything about Nazis or face jail time or some other severe penalty

Complete bullshit. You can say a lot about nazis and the nazi era. You can discuss this, and you are even free to utter dumb sentences like "not everything was bad in nazi germany" (which is technically spoken true, but a dumb statement nethertheless as a german tv personality badly learned a while a ago).

You are only banned from showing symbols like the swastika, play/sing some songs like the "Horst Wessel Lied" (horst wessel song, hymn of the nazi party), deny the holocaust or praise the unlawful nazi regime. But even doing this will most of the time not lead you into jail. A fine will do in most cases.

Now you might argue that this is against freedom of speech, but as a german i feel that given our history there is very good reason to ban said things, especially denying the holocaust. Our ancestors have done enough harm to e.g. jews, there is no need to further harm them by allowing to state that the horror they (the few who were not killed) encountered actually never happened.

I could go on on but in short I put Germany up there with China, not quiet as bad

Yes, you could go on with bullshit claims, but this still puts germany nowhere near china. Not quite as bad? That is the understatement of the year.

but still the fact that free speech is merely an illusion

Still the fact is that free speech is actually provided in germany. But most of us germans (and europeans in general) have a different feeling of the meaning of free speech. Free speech is fine, but the right to it ends where others are harmed. I don't have a problem with that, and most people i know don't have either. This concept might be hard to grasp for a citizen of the United States, but i'm still fine with it and i don't feel that i'm missing some of the banned speech.

there makes me feel that Germany has a ways to go in terms of personal liberties when compared to several other democratic countries in the western world.

I take it that you are from the US. People like you also have a long way to go until you will finally understand that the us american believes are not the holy grail to which the whole world needs to subscribe.

Re:Schadenfreude

[jimbolauski]

So you have free speech by you can't freely say the the holocaust didn't happen, In most free countries free speech is the right to say anything no matter how ignorant with out penalty under the law. There are two exemptions yelling fire in a theater and calling for violence, everything else is protected. Germany has limited speech in that they can criticize the government but they are not free to say what they please without the retribution of the government. The fact that you are complicit with less rights doesn't change anything citizens in North Korea and China are fine with their lack or rights but they still are not free.