Slashdot Mirror
US Activists Oppose US Govt Calls To Weaken EU Privacy Rules
judgecorp writes "The European Commission has proposals for data privacy (including the 'right to be forgotten') and the U.S. government is opposing them. Now U.S. activists have arrived in Brussels to lobby against their government's opposition to the European measures. The move comes following reports of 'extreme' lobbying by U.S. authorities against the European proposals."
Although the "right to be forgotten" raises some free speech issues, it doesn't seem like a bad idea in principle.
Extreme lobbying, such as employed in Iraq, etc., etc?
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
...the "right to be forgotten" raises some free speech issues...
is one way to look at it, but the other way to look at it is that free speech raises some privacy issues. As the Stanford Law Review article recognises, there's a tension between the two and different cultures choose to give them different weights. That doesn't make either culture right or wrong.
With extreme prejudice? I've seen 24.
The European Commission has proposals for data privacy (including the 'right to be forgotten') and the U.S. government is opposing them.
U.S. has no actual vote or authority in Europe.
Or should not, anyway.
WTF is the U.S. even coming from here, opposing laws in sovereign countries (that are not at all easy to invade)
Our personal data is worth money to others. They don't want their money taken from them.
"But the right to delete data becomes far more controversial when it involves Fleischerâ(TM)s second category: âoeIf I post something, and someone else copies it and re-posts it on their own site, do I have the right to delete it?â Imagine a teenager regrets posting a picture of herself with a bottle of beer on her own site and after deleting it, later discovers that several of her friends have copied and reposted the picture on their own sites. If she asks them to take down the pictures, and her friends refuse or cannot be found, should Facebook be forced to delete the picture from her friendsâ(TM) albums without the ownersâ(TM) consent based solely on the teenagerâ(TM)s objection?"
If Universal posts the latest Spiderman movie and I re-post it, they can have it taken down. This is just normal copyright and that's not limited to big companies or rich people.
] Finally, there is Fleischerâ(TM)s third category of takedown requests: âoeIf someone else posts something about me, do I have a right to delete it?â This, of course, raises the most serious concerns about free expression. The U.S. Supreme Court has held that states cannot pass laws restricting the media from disseminating truthful but embarrassing informationâ"such as the name of a rape victimâ"as long as the information was legally acquired.
The proposed European regulation, however, treats takedown requests for truthful information posted by others identically to takedown requests for photos Iâ(TM)ve posted myself that have then been copied by others: both are included in the definition of personal data as âoeany information relatingâ to me, regardless of its source. I can demand takedown and the burden, once again, is on the third party to prove that it falls within the exception for journalistic, artistic, or literary exception.
This one sucks and shouldn't be there. Obviously people should be able to talk about others even if it's not journalism or art.
Generally, I think the questions on what's ok and what's not have been solved in law long before the Internet existed. This is just about spelling out how hosters should deal with takedown notices etc.
Wait... so today it's OK for people to be in control of what happens to their data? In other words, they have the right to stop OTHER people from making copies of it without their permission?
But step back a few stories and when it's a song or movie, it's no longer up to the person who created it whether it ends up copied all around the world for free, and they have no right to stop other people from copying it?
Uhh....
we the us govt are telling you to do as well fucking tell you cause its good for americans. WE don't fucking care about anyone else but our greedy lawyers and making our military uber cool.
NOW if you dont do as we want we'll send secret cia agents all over europe and fuck with you.
signed
buba obama ( head of homeworld security )
This is a little different because the EU is not [yet] a major wrongdoer with respect to privacy. The protest is more to bolster their nerve against heavy pressure from the US govt (a ne'er-do-well).
It enables the EU commissioners to say "The US is divided on this issue of privacy, with the govt saying one thing yet important people and organisations dissent)." So they get to do what they want anyways.
The US has no right to be lobbying the EU. The politicians are elected to represent the people, not foreign interests.
If I could trust the government to be smart about the rules they make, and to really understand web technology, the new restrictions might seem mildly attractive. Given the general incompetence of government, I think it best that slashdot decides how slashdot handles login, cookies, etc.
And everyone else is pissed off about the US Gov doing the same thing.
Except with guns. Lots of guns.
Lobbying is corruption. Corruption is illegal and immoral.
Or did you just then by talking bollocks?
The data isn't theirs.
The movie isn't theirs.
The movie has been released as public, the copyrights go to the public domain. Eventually. The copyrights are lasting too long.
Meanwhile my personal information is NOT being sold to the public. The data remains mine. FB may have it for a while, but it never got sold to them.
My facebook solution is to enforce my right to be forgotten personally. Comments on friends' posts that are public are removed after 2 days. Comments on friends' posts that are private are removed after 7 days. Yes this screws with comment threads but there's no other way to enforce my right to be forgotten and something that appears innocent now coming back to haunt me in 20 years.
You say, "Although the "right to be forgotten" raises some free speech issues, it doesn't seem like a bad idea in principle." but what if that's only because the authors of the "right to be forgotten" have invoked that right against you in regards to the negative aspects of their proposal?
The idea that you have rights over information that you have already given away which could override my freedom of thought is horrifying in the extreme.
As proposed, Slashdot (a US company) could be forced to delete posts made by US citizens, if those posts mention someone in the EU. That's a legitimate concern. Had this law been in place before, Mussoluni's "right to be forgotten" would mean he could order Facebook to delete any posts critical of him.
The EU will itself monitor all online communications in real time through INDECT. The rationale it has given for developing this capability is for automated detection of child pornography and organ trading. Yes, organ trading is such an issue in the EU that all online communications must be monitored at all times to detect it.
The EU needs to die off. It is harmful to humanity due to particular decisions taken by the individuals involved with it. They had a choice but made the wrong one.
Say, if Hitler were still alive, or the internet existed and these proposals were in effect at the time, what could he legitimately request under these proposals? It's a little hazy understanding what the implications of these proposals are; does the benefit of hindsight and a well-known example make it any clearer what rights are provided and what's feasible under these circumstances?
Godwin...
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
Actually, it seems like a stupid idea in principal.
I've seen more good rulings come out of EU than the US. With no in-depth information on a subject, I would more trust the EU with my person (/personal information) than the US (Government/US companies)...
Politicians are always this and that http://www.cusabio.com/pro_11.html
You would then be encouraged to say whatever you wanted. The SS would then send for you...
Nice Godwin, by the way.
Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
I really wish we would adopt the European standards on privacy. This is one area where I freely admit the Euro's are doing things right and we are blatantly being ass backwards about things.
Another practical example of how undemocratic the EU became: no need to lobby elected Members of European Parliament, just lobby the unelected European Commission. I got the feeling that a single US lobbyist weight more on UE politics than any number of EU citizens.
post publicly, I fully expect the public can see it. If I don't want it seen, I don't post it.
Sorry, to clarify -- assuming he was no longer in power.
I'm so glad the EU is doing something right and we're standing up to unhealthy US corporate practices.
The right to be forgotten is a brilliant idea. I know, I had it myself.
Who gains? The people.
Who loses? Companies whose business model is to whore our data.
Obviously, this right could only be invoked if the invoker was not in debt to the data-holding company. Likewise, the data-holding company can not be held responsible for consequences of missing data.
There are also some subtleties. Should eg FB be obliged to remove all content Shared from a 'forgotten' user? Should Google be obliged to delete any data associated with an IP you used at a certain time?
Regardless, this is a brilliant idea and the free world should be pushing hard for it if they want to remain free.
>... the US ... Europe is already a super power.
Someone has an inferiority complex.
It would suffice to alter the name to "someone", no need to delete it (but probably simpler)
How would Slashdot be forced? Why would a European law have jurisdiction in the U.S.? I suppose the EU could begin blocking sites that don't comply. Some sort of Great Firewall of Europe I suppose.
As I recall, when he was no longer in power he was also dead. I think this limits the possibility of requesting information to be deleted somewhat.
is to end the illusion that people are perfect.
Because slashdot is owned by Dice Holdings, and Dice Holdings does business in the EU? If they fail to comply they can be fined, assets seized, etc etc.?
In this case, you have to balance the right of the public to know with the right of the person to stay private. Hitler would be considered a "person of public interest", and thus the right for the public to know would prevail. It's basicly the same with current journalism. You can't put an article in a journal about your neighbour with full name and address, and detailling every step he takes, free speech issues be damned. And EU data privacy laws just do the same for data. There are other rights that are present in the offline world for a long time (right to the own picture, covering for instance pictures others take of you), and the "right to be forgotten" is just an online version of the same rights.
You're wrong. The company must be in the US.
The US is currently the only country who believe that companies outside their territory fall into the jurisdiction of Texas courts.
They are asking the facebook company. If the facebook company has a commercial presence in EU , then they better obey the law and court order. Again, as all in those discussion you have to separate the web site, to the company. The court order are going to the company where it has presence. It does not matter afterward if the web page is chaos.ru or texas.us, the company has to obey the court order because of its commercial rpesenc in EU. naturally if facebook is ready to abandon completely the EU market that's another story.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
"On Friday, The Journal News caved under pressure of gun advocates and shut down the interactive maps which contained the names and addresses of licensed gun owners in upstate New York. The maps are still visible on the site, however they are simply static images. The Journal News published the interactive maps on December 23 which caused significant backlash. In a similar move, Gawker published the names of licensed gun owners in New York City without addresses. New York state Senator Greg Ball (Republican) called the removal of the data a 'huge win.' On Saturday, an anonymous user leaked the raw data used to build The Journal News maps."
And how many on that thread were decrying the removal of this information so that the ownership of guns can be forgotten on the internet?
None.
The US regime has enough problems at home, with its human rights abuses, economic collapse, currency collapse, and likely either debt default, or hyperinflation.
Europe should stand up the this kind of Nazi bullying, by a regime that is in no position to preach to anyone else, given its own dismal record, on nearly every front, over the last century. I'm just glad I'm not an American.
As proposed, Slashdot (a US company) could be forced to delete posts made by US citizens, if those posts mention someone in the EU.
NO. That is absolutely NOT what the right to be forgotten is about.
The right will give an individual to have THEIR data removed from sites. Data that they themselves uploaded, such as posts they made or photos they shared. If you see one of those photos and decide to write a blog post about it then your blog is perfectly safe and won't be covered by this right.
The right to be forgotten is not about purging information about yourself from the internet, it is about having companies delete your data when asked to. That means if you delete your Facebook profile it really is deleted, and Facebook can't carry on displaying your photos to other people or displaying your name in search results or store information about you any more. If other people post on their wall mentioning your name there is nothing you can do about it, beyond the usual legal protections against libel etc.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
To be getting all this attention, they really must be onto something. I say keep going and see what happens...
do not quit your day job to be a writer
many negatives do not add up to "interesting" prose. I had to read your text to read what the title means.
too bad they give everyone access to this kind of stuff these days. sheesh..
It would be better if you actually read the proposals. There are three categories for the proposed "right to be forgotten" edict. The first category is as you mention, but it is only the first category. Roughly speaking, category 2 is copies of the data you uploaded (i.e. friends copy your photos or posts) and category 3 is any data about you.
And the "right to be forgotten" is supposed to cover all three. Read "Nineteen Eighty Four" for an idea of how that will work. Winston Smith works in the Ministry of Information going through all the old newspaper archives "updating" them with the "new history". Any company on the Internet will have to do that: "updating history" to remove valid, true facts that someone has requested be removed about themselves.
Imagine a financial company hiring people with long histories of embezzlement, fraud, blackmail, etc. simply because that information has been removed.
Imagine a woman marrying a man with a long, long history of wife beating, adultery, etc. because those FACTS have been "forgotten".
Where is the rest of the world's right to know simple facts about others they need to trust?
When someone searched for my name the first result would be a comment I made when I was 16 years old on a product on a popular shopping site.
The comment I made then was technically inaccurate, but I didn't know that back then. It wasn't possible to remove it so I had to contact the site and ask them to remove it for me, which they did.
I live in the EU and I want "the right to be forgotten" to remain because of what happened to me.
To me it sounds like you don't think people can change.
There used to be a "right" to be forgotten in the US.
People used to move a couple states away to reset the clock.
But, sadly, we sold out to the former Reichsmarshals of the world.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
You should read the proposals, because apparently you only skimmed them. Yes, category 3 does include data about you, but only data collected by companies for commercial purposes. To be absolutely clear a newspaper article about your criminal behaviour would not be subject to removal. Blog posts about you would not be subject to removal. Only data collected for purposes like creating an online profile or establishing a business relationship.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
It will work similarly to DMCA take-down requests. Only affects companies with interests in the EU, failure to comply will open them up to being sued and hit with fines.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC