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French Officials Say EU Will Sanction Google Over Privacy
taz346 writes "French officials said on Monday that the EU intends to sanction Google after the Internet search giant failed to respond to concerns about its privacy policy. 'At the end of a four-month delay accorded to Google to comply with the European data protection directive and to implement effectively (our) recommendations, no answer has been given,' said France's CNIL data protection agency. Google's new policy, implemented in March 2012, allows it to track users over multiple sites. Users who sign in to Google services cannot opt out. CNIL said a working group would meet next week to begin work on 'coercive actions which should be implemented before the summer' against Google."
Trying to protect its citizens' privacy!
The CNIL (a French agency checking privacy issues on internet) is almost powerless: they can barely "suggest" stuff to be done, maybe, once every new moon, even on France-only related issues. They can't propose laws or impose anything on anyone. I believe google is well aware of their power and responded adequatly :-)
Not saying that nothing should be done on the issue, but it won't work at such a small scale.
but you don't understand, peoples *have* to use google. I've seen it, if you don't use google's services, someone come at your house, put a loaded gun on the side of your head, and whisper softly in your ear "would you kindly log yourself into our services?".
Or maybe not, my memory is fuzzy on the details.
Sadly, that is the level of discourse common amongst fanbois of any camp. (I refer to the post I'm replying to.)
The summary isn't much better: the article accurately says that Google wants to consolidate user data across Google's "services", into "track users over multiple sites" which is quite different and not relevant to this issue.
Personally, I get annoyed at how often I have to re-enter data across the various Google services, because the different services aren't allowed to share data. I'm not attributing altruism to Google's change, but it still seems like progress to me.
I also don't appreciate the fact that they have many, complicated privacy policies, and I really appreciate the fact that this change reduces them all to one, much simpler, policy.
Seriously, EU, you should go after PayPal first. They are doing whatever the fuck they want over here.
If you have a trouble with how Google tracks you, why would you object to the suggestion that you not use Google?
Oh wait, wanting stuff for free is the thing I'd expect a European to say.
See what I did there?
Life needs more saving throws.
This is perhaps the single most stupid thing I've read on this topic. You admit to being an avid user of Google's services, yet you object to the "price" that they offer those services for. When you go to the grocery store, if you don't like the price of milk, do you demand that the government make the store give it to you for free?
Don't want to agree to Google's terms of use? I have a perfect solution for you - use somebody else's services.
Oh, and you're on the internet. Good luck with that fantasy of keeping your data under your absolute control...
Life needs more saving throws.
Visiting almost any site on the web means you are using Google. Google Analytics, Ads, and blogging platforms... This isn't some optional service that you can simply choose not to use, like Dropbox or MS Office.
Your argument is, practically speaking, like saying, "don't like lead pollution in the air from gasoline? just don't breath in the lead particles."
No one is forced to use Google. If you don't want them to do things with your data, don't give it to them.
Ah it looks like you're right, at least in terms of any serious sanctions. They do have the authority to impose fines, but the fine amounts look so small I assume Google just doesn't care. In fact, from what I can find, Google currently holds the record for a CNIL fine: in 2011 they were fined 100,000 Euros over wifi data that was recorded by Google Street View cars. They didn't bother to send any response to the inquiry that time, either.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Especially when said corporations are not European and not government. France has no problem amassing ridiculous amounts of data (of questionable quality) to use against their own citizens, here is a list (only available in French unfortunately).
Said differently: when your government does something that has a positive impact for you, it doesn't mean it's doing it for you. A pessimist would argue that there likely is a higher interest at stake.
Issue is that privacy laws are set based on two things:
1. Cultural expectations of privacy in the region.
2. Attempts at circumventing aforementioned expectations for various reasons such as profit.
Issue is that nothing like google existed when current laws were drafted. It does now and it's in a clear and direct opposition with 1. in EU. This means that privacy watchdogs will either have to find applicable laws that will be interpreted in a way that fits 1. and goes against what google does (and many laws in these areas are often drafted specifically to allow for this by executive organs without forcing legislation changes) or they will push new legislation to specifically outlaw what google is currently doing.
The conflict was pretty obvious even with old google services, but it was viewed as a tolerable one. When google unified its services, pretty much every privacy watchdog across the continent red flagged the changes and made inquiries to google as to what it intends to do to resolve this conflict. Google did the (apparently) stupid thing by going with "we're too big to care, fuck off" answer of "we're withing the scope of law". A really stupid answer when you're talking to organisations that have power to both interpret laws as well as wield heavy influence in legislative process through being specialists in their respective field that is essentially consulted and relied upon to maintain privacy rules.
I don't see a good outcome for google unless they intend to spend a lot of effort lobbying hard. Considering that I doubt stupidity being the thing behind decision here, as there are plenty of smart people at google, it's likely that google is hoping to push for paradigm shift and is going all-in.
This obviously means that if it loses, it stands to lose a lot.