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Comment by comrade1 | Hacker News Reader

I wonder if we'll see a fracturing of the Internet. I live in Switzerland and I am already seeing reports in the news of companies moving/expanding data centers here. As someone that lives in Europe (but not EU thankfully) I will try to avoid sending too much info to the u.s.

yes, I know it's ironic that I'm posting this on a u.s. site.

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And whats exactly the reason for the side blow against the EU? Oo

Most of the EU countries are in cahoots with the NSA (reportedly to get around pesky legal restrictions on domestic spying; don't remember if this was media speculation or shown to be true). Wouldn't be surprised if Switzerland is too.

Yea, it is unfortunate that the Constitution and similar were designed before it was easy to spy on other countries's communications.

The Constitution has built-in provisions for future modifications, i.e. the Fourth amendment.

And yet, not a single amendment has been enacted through an Article V Convention.

It's certainly true for Belgium.

Confusingly the EU has supposedly strong laws about exporting private data outside the EU.

ECHELON report from EU parliament showed that 5 countries (UK, US, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand) were part of ECHELON and gave lists to each other as a way to avoid laws about spying on their own citizens.

That EU parliament report is very old now (pre 9/11) and there are a bunch of more recent laws that probably exempt GCHQ and others from these laws. But I could be wrong; I haven't kept up; and I welcome corrections. I have no idea what parts of RIPA (regulation of investigatory powers act, UK law) are enacted or not, and what exemptions it has for GCHQ.

Yeah I was way over reaching. I've given up on following the exact details of the NSA revelations and now I'm just enjoying the ride. It's probably safe to just assume from now on that I'm always being spied on and that I should stop looking at nuclear space propulsion papers.

> "Directive 2006/24/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 March 2006 on the retention of data generated or processed in connection with the provision of publicly available electronic communications services or of public communications networks and amending Directive 2002/58/EC"

> According to the directive, member states will have to store citizens' telecommunications data for six to 24 months stipulating a maximum time period. Under the directive the police and security agencies will be able to request access to details such as IP address and time of use of every email, phone call and text message sent or received. A permission to access the information will be granted only by a court.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_Retention_Directive

I find your user name more ironic than you posting this on a U.S. site.

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