They already have to meet GDPR in Europe, it's actually easier to not maintain two separate sets of rules, so the decision to not give people worldwide the same protections as in Europe is an intentional choice to do more work to give people less privacy.
But it's more profitable to maintain two separate sets of rules in this case.
Am I missing something?
Going back to the top of the thread, the idea was that this is a decision that looks bad in a moment where everyone’s looking at Facebook.
If extending the behaviour worldwide were a difficult engineering feat, that’d provide a simple outward justification for Facebook to not bother.
But in reality, It’s more difficult to keep the two systems around.
Taking that path implies that Facebook actively benefits from breaking the EU law, and justifying it outwardly in the current climate means establishing how the EU law actively harms Facebook’s users... while not admitting that they violate user’s privacy, and profit from doing so.
[And as others have suggested... even if it’s the right move to implement things this way — it makes ~0 sense to draw attention to it.]
"If your enterprise has a presence on the internet in the form of a website and if your enterprise collects personal data from customers regardless of where those customers are located, it is subject to the provisions of the GDPR." [1]
[1] https://www.techrepublic.com/article/the-eu-general-data-pro...
Short of actually requiring you to upload your passport, how can Facebook make sure only European citizens get the added privacy?
Because I know, as a non-European, I want to get in on this action.
What about users who have two or more citizenships? What about users who have none? What about users who have citizenship only in countries the site doesn't recognize?
> Short of actually requiring you to upload your passport
Given that this is about the GDPR, wouldn't that only make things worse for the site? Edit: also, what about people who have neither a passport nor an identity card?
As long as one of them is in the EU, the GDPR would presumably apply. Generally you get all the rights (and responsibilities) of all your citizenships should you have multiple. Even without multiple citizenships this often arises since you have have rights as a resident in one country, while having a single citizenship in another country.
> What about users who have none?
The GDPR would not apply.
> ... what about people who have neither a passport nor an identity card?
The easy out would be to allow the GDPR benefits to anyone who claimed to be from the EU, without requiring them to prove it. This would be compatible with the GDPR, although it might allow some "leakage" (from Facebook's perspective) in that people outside of the EU might fraudulently claim the GDPR benefits.
Not possible. Can't say 100% about all countries, but in my country it's a must to have either passport or ID once you hit 16. There's even a small fine if you don't take out or renew personal document on time.
US and their passport-less life looks very strange from Europe. You can't do anything without ID in EU. No bank account, no employment, no driving license and the list couldgo on and on.
(However to get back onto topic, most people in the UK will have a passport, otherwise they should have a NINo allocated at birth. For the people who have neither, the GDPR is the least of their worries.)
However, personal number is not guaranteed to be unique because of how it's issued. We have funny stories once in a while when people with similar (or even identical) names happen to have same personal number. A photocopy of ID in important governmental or banking actions.
What happens if a site operator in Iowa just ignores it.
Okay, they might get a letter or two that they place in the circular file.
Other European businesses, will be banned from doing business with them. For facebook they can stop them buying advertising space, for others they might issue orders to block payments to them. Some small players in Iowa may still get away from things but no one notable will.
Now, could Zuck have said something more articulate than “We’re still nailing down details on this, but it should directionally be, in spirit, the whole thing?” Absolutely. He could have said "we'll be working to create a streamlined interface for people to achieve many of the most important benefits enjoyed by EU residents under the GDPR, without requiring them to jump through legal hoops and read a 90-page law to format a request correctly. This is all in progress, but we're committed to making radical transparency accessible to our users." Then there could have been positive spin. But instead the "less is more" approach leads to articles that assume the company to be operating in bad faith.
But it seems like a complex law and it's likely we won't know the hidden downsides until well after it's implemented.
Can you enuciate where the GDPR excels and fails, or is national origin insinuation enough?
No
Facebook could incorporate the bulk of the EU's GDPR into its privacy policy without violating U.S. law. The same could not be said of Chinese policies.
Forget decide--why did he feel the need to make a personal announcement? He is too busy to testify in front of the United Kingdom's MPs [1]. Yet he can find time to personally throw dirt on the EU's privacy rules?
For the head of a social network, this man is shockingly clueless.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-cambridge-analyt...
Because it sends a bad message, and Parliament et al have the ability to materially affect facebook's revenue by passing & enforcing laws like the GDPR etc
The GDPR version of Facebook really can’t function as a social network - at least not the kind of social network that we would recognize today. So it may be easier to have one version, but that’s not going to happen, and it would be a disservice for the 99% of users that don’t care about privacy but do care about all of the features they are going to have to give up.
Could you explain that?
My point was that the law leaves massive room for interpretation. The threat of aggressive application and interpretation of this law could deliver significant leverage to the EU over these companies in matters reaching far beyond privacy.