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US Unhappy With Australians Storing Data On Australian Shores
Fluffeh writes "The United States' global trade representative has strongly criticized a perceived preference on the part of large Australian organizations for hosting their data on-shore in Australia, claiming it created a significant trade barrier for U.S. technology firms. A number of U.S. companies had expressed concerns that various departments in the Australian Government, namely the Department of Defence had been sending negative messages about cloud providers based outside the country, implying that 'hosting data overseas, including in the United States, by definition entails greater risk and unduly exposes consumers to their data being scrutinized by foreign governments.' Recently, Acting Victorian Privacy Commissioner Anthony Bendall highlighted some of the privacy concerns with cloud computing, particularly in its use by the local government. He said the main problems were the lack of control over stored data and privacy, in overseas cloud service providers."
The irony-meter is off the charts. Or is this a late April-fools-article?
The hell you say! Saving data in your own country, so that foreign governments can't judge your citizens by their laws? That's crazy talk, I think you should have a serious conversation with my sponsor, the MPAA.
Why would this be a problem? The farther away their "cloud" is, the worse the performance. There's enough of a performance hit just trying to cram all that data through a company's entartube without stretching that tube many thousands of miles for no good reason.
Is that really them throwing their toys out of the pram?!
"How dare the Aussies deny us from intercepting data and shutting down sites by Australian companies and citizens"
My other Sig is very funny.
Whoever is in charge of Australia's defence department is an asshole and I happen to agree with him. WHY is it even close to being a good idea to send data out like that and especially in the US? Sorry, but I don't trust the US government.
Australia and New Zealand are notorious for having "pipe problems" due to the long-haul links they have to use, and the US expects them to have all their critical business data travelling those overloaded pipes for the convenience of US agencies and companies??!?!!?!
So the convenience of American firms is now justification for slagging the sound and reasonable business practices of foreign nations?
Navel gazing US again. If they navel gaze any closer they're going to find themselves eyeballing their own stomachs from the inside... :P
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
I live in the US. With the recent mega upload fiasco and some of the other craziness, I think it's a smart move for foreigners to avoid hosting in the US.
US courts are trying to reach into other countries now. We've got way to much craziness here to trust us. The government should have known their actions will have consequences.
One of the reasons we don't like hosting stuff on American servers is due to one of their laws that the FBI (and similar agencies) can obtain data with a warrant that tells the service (cloud) provider not to tell the customer us. We have our own private cloud infrastructure here in Perth and spread to Adelaide and Sydney with talks of having some in Singapore. We do not want our data on cloud infrastructure we don't manage in another country.
on suspected members of Men-At-Work will soon follow.
As someone who regularly solutions cloud services for customers, I can assure you, the exact location of the cloud is very important to our big customers. Being able to say it's based out of entirely Canadian datacenters on an entirely Canadian network is a huge advantage over our competitors south of the border. It's not like any of them have been bitten yet, but the perception is that their data is much less safe in another country.
Is that the person responsible for safeguarding Victoria's secret?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Fuck You.
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
As a US citizen, I can't help but think WTF. Let them (and the rest of the world, for that matter) do whatever the fuck they want.
Did the clown sprouting this crap listen to himself? God forbid a country that isn't the USA look after it's own industries and interests! To be honest I and many Aussies can't trust the Yanks as far as we could throw them, let alone let them store our data. Typical self centred 2 year old tantrum by some Yank dickwad who thinks the world should revolve around the USA. Yet another reason to build a 100ft wall around the USA until their idiot government/corporations (same thing?) learn to play with the grown ups.
The point of a trade representative to another country is to shill, without principle, for the interests of their country's economy. If the US Trade Representative gets too pushy, just remind him that if the US ever has any intention of "containing China," Australia is one of those "do not piss off, under any circumstances" regional bases. It's especially important to have on our good side in the event China ever goes batshit crazy by seizing Taiwan, then says "since we've already risked WWIII, let's just go ahead and invade South Korea and Japan as well since their armies aren't worth shit."
Would you store your beer collection in a country where it's legal to piss in it?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I work for an American cloud service provider, and even we do not want to store our(customers') data in the U.S. The patriot act is a huge obstacle when selling to foreign customers. Hence why we have a major data center in Canada, and are looking at putting one in the U.K.
(see http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/12/patriot-act-and-privacy-laws-take-a-bite-out-of-us-cloud-business.ars)
AccountKiller
Dear Australia,
I, an American Citizen and veteran of the Marine Corps where I served an an infantry machine gunner, and filling billets including intelligence analyst and company clerk, sincerely apologize for this.
Although this isn't my fault (for I was not allowed to vote while I was in the service. This is my opinion, I found it too much of a coincidence that my ballot and that of a friend from the same state arrived exactly 1 month to the day after it was supposed to be postmarked for return. Twice.), you can bet I will vote this round, and will not be voting for anyone that is currently in office, for they all allow these things to happen, which is an embarrassment to us all.
I'm E-mailing my senators and congressman now. I have other concerns to raise with them anyway, like why my state charges sales tax on private sales of vehicles (double taxation) and why they want to charge tax on the Real Market Value of said vehicle even though it was sold for 1/3 that price (taxing money not spent).
Sincerely,
Troubled American Citizen
P.S. Are you guys still open for citizenship? At times it's more prudent to abandon a sinking vessel rather than continue trying to fix what is so severely broken.
In Canada, it is illegal for public agencies or IT companies serving them to store customer/member data on US-operated servers because the Patriot Act contravenes Canadian privacy laws. Many other Canadian associations and businesses have similar policies, because Patriot Act searches would violate their infomration privacy policy.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?