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Facebook To Put 1.5 Billion Users Out of Reach of New EU Privacy Law (reuters.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Facebook: If a new European law restricting what companies can do with people's online data went into effect tomorrow, almost 1.9 billion Facebook users around the world would be protected by it. The online social network is making changes that ensure the number will be much smaller. Facebook members outside the United States and Canada, whether they know it or not, are currently governed by terms of service agreed with the company's international headquarters in Ireland. Next month, Facebook is planning to make that the case for only European users, meaning 1.5 billion members in Africa, Asia, Australia and Latin America will not fall under the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which takes effect on May 25. That removes a huge potential liability for Facebook, as the new EU law allows for fines of up to 4 percent of global annual revenue for infractions, which in Facebook's case could mean billions of dollars.
Zuckerberg's apology tour was short-lived, back to usual business.
Targeted ads are useless anyway. People encountering them gets the ads after they already have bought an item of that type.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
Targeted ads CAN be sensible if they're for the general type of item. When I buy a new CPU, showing me ads for graphic cards rather than running shoes is sensible.
Ok, that I have adblockers and keep tuning them to the point where no ads get shown render both moot but ... shhhh, keep the ad industry thinking it is relevant, so it keeps funding the pages we like!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
so they get to pay Irish tax rates, I ought to get Irish privacy. I ought to, but looks like I don't.
I do like how the EU does fines. A percentage of gross revenue. Here in the states we do dollar amounts, which tends to make them less than the profit from the crime.
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