No one in my circles cares about Facebook leaving Europe. Until they realize that Facebook includes Instagram and WhatsApp and they do actually use those other services.
Point being: to all the commenters saying no one cares, a lot more people care than you think.
Eh. If all three of those left the US I would care exactly not at all. There are better alternatives and if FB et al disappeared suddenly it would just create room for those services to take hold.
if WhatsApp goes people would move to signal or telegram.
Instagram is a bit trickier, but I'm fairly sure people would start making a new one immediately. You could even relatively easily transfer everything and everyone across using the zip you can get thanks to GPDR.
Leaving Whatsapp is hard because everyone is using it. But suppose whatsapp becomes unavailable for whatever reason, people will turn to other apps within hours (actually within a hour). In fact many people already have Telegram/Signal on their phone (although not using it).
As for instagram, things are a bit different. But the way I see it, 1- general population isn't using it. 2- This is not a necessary tool like whatsapp. Something else will fill the void but it will take some considerable time.
That's exactly why the EU is doing this. The various EU courts all have issue with the fact that the US Government can force US Companies to share data with US Intelligence companies even if that data resides outside of the US. This is why simply storing the data in the EU isn't enough.
Our government allows intelligence agencies to spy on everyone, and as a result foreign countries do not trust us. As long as other countries have to worry about US companies sharing data under gag orders those countries will not trust our companies with their data. Nor should they.
This was fake news since day 1. There was never any source which pointed back to Facebook implying any such thing. Just tech bloggers/clickbait journalists doing what they do best.
Reading Facebook's own reports? "“If a new transatlantic data transfer framework is not adopted and we are unable to continue to rely on SCCs (standard contractual clauses) or rely upon other alternative means of data transfers from Europe to the United States, we will likely be unable to offer a number of our most significant products and services, including Facebook and Instagram, in Europe."
Their form 10-k, in listing all the business risks, said something along the lines of "if it becomes illegal to operate in Europe we'll have to stop operating in Europe". Then the clickbait factories were off to the races.
This is actually an interesting case study of who is spreading and consuming fake news.
This fake news reached the top of reddit and trended on Twitter. Both are dominated by users who think of themselves as smarter than the fake news consuming boomers on Facebook.
In my country it was reported by both the tabloids and mainstream media. Only the publicly owned Danmarks Radio (Danish BBC) didn't spread this fake news.
This was not just fake news, this was deliberate misinformation. A title saying 'FB threatens to leave EU' means something very different from 'FB lists EU regulation as a potential threat to business in SEC filings'
> To help personalize content, tailor and measure ads, and provide a safer experience, we use cookies. By clicking or navigating the site, you agree to allow our collection of information on and off Facebook through cookies. Learn more, including about available controls: Cookies Policy
How am I supposed to read the cookies policy without clicking or navigating?
To be fair seems like a backoff, but the problem is - nobody cares. Millions of man-hours saved a day. On a serious note - that market would be filled in a month...
Meta does not want to understand. People are not happy that their data is Meta's business and that, as a result, Meta keeps socially engineering them to milk more of their time.
People are not even mad about ads, they are mad at the waste of time and general sense that FB brings the worst out of you.
They need to shift their business, changing the landscape (metaverse) will not change anything or trying to convince people that what they offer is great is a long term losing proposition, imh.
I don't think that Facebook needs to address the fear in people from leaving Europe.
If nothing else, they've definitely heard feedback that people wouldn't mind at all if they left.
>But the simple reality is that Meta, like many other businesses, organisations and services, relies on data transfers between the EU and the US in order to operate our global services
Yeah.. The reality is you don't really have to transfer anything out of EU in order to keep your service running. Liars
> The reality is you don't really have to transfer anything out of EU in order to keep your service running.
Practically speaking, running FB in a way that doesn't transfer anything out of the EU would involve either:
1. Siloing off the EU facebook, with no contact with the US side
or
2. Building a federated facebook, which transfers across e.g. only the timeline entries US friends are granted view access to
The former would not be well-accepted, as it would cut off communication from e.g. international relatives, and would be a rather large project to launch. The latter would be an even bigger rearchitecture, which would likely take, at a minimum, several years to complete, since it's unlikely this was ever anticipated as being a possibility when FB was originally created.
So, I sympathize with them - while in the long term they might be able to find a solution, in the short-to-medium term, FB would have no choice to stop operating.
"Yeah.. The reality is you don't really have to transfer anything out of EU in order to keep your service running. Liars" - nixass
Look, I realize I'm not an elite hacker news hacker, but how can I as a US user look at my friends posts in germany without them transferring data to me in the US?
What makes this so obviously a lie that such strong language is called for?
Large computer systems with baked in assumptions of the fact that data locality regulations wouldn't be as strict as they are in 2022 are... difficult to update
Would be really great to see even more regulation to make these so-called “data businesses” to stop gambling with people’s information.
One example of that would a mandatory paid option which takes you out of all company data sharing stuff.
I dont use any facebook/Meta related platforms such as facebook, instagram or whatsapp. But it makes me sick seeing people around me addicted to it, due to their shady operation patterns.
> Yeah.. The reality is you don't really have to transfer anything out of EU in order to keep your service running. Liars
Only as long as your users are fine to only talk with people from their "world region cluster". Everyone else would not be able to communicate with, say, family that lives overseas.
> Yeah.. The reality is you don't really have to transfer anything out of EU in order to keep your service running. Liars
Can you explain to me how would you allow communication between EU and USA users without transferring any data out of EU? Expect for putting all the datacenters in EU?
> The reality is you don't really have to transfer anything out of EU in order to keep your service running. Liars
Ok you would have to make actual legal guarantees that no PII data will _ever_ be processed outside of the EU. given that this effectively means that if you fly out of the EU, or are _routed_ out of the EU, you won't be able to use those services. This is because PII is anything personal to you, and processing means anything that makes decisions, like routing based on IP or username.
This isn't actually a facebook specific problem S3/azure/google and their customers all have the same problem.
About 5 years ago, I was told Facebook uses a single global “write” datacenter, which works for their use case of read-mostly.
I’m not sure it this is still the case, but assuming it is, wouldn’t that make for a reasonable argument why it would be “impossible” (a.k.a. possible but non-trivial) to keep the data in the EU?
I live in Mexico and have several friends in different EU countries. Would it be possible for me to follow them , read their feeds and interact normally if I was in the US and Facebook blocked data transfers between EU/US?
> Meta Is Absolutely Not Threatening to Leave Europe
But then in the body of their post...
> EU-US data transfers mechanisms poses a threat to our ability to serve European consumers and operate our business in Europe [and] we have absolutely no desire to withdraw from Europe, of course we don’t, But the simple reality is that Meta relies on data transfers between the EU and the US.
I mean, that sounds like a threat to leave to me? If you can't operate your business in Europe? Talk about mixed messaging and double-speak!
Why does this sound like a series of Tweets? I cannot believe an SVP wrote this and thought it was a professional enough tone to publish. It reflects doubly bad on Meta because not only do Europe’s (or Apple’s or Google’s or whatever enemy du jour) privacy laws limit their ability to execute (as seen from their latest quarterly results), but they don’t even have the maturity to address the situation without more whining about how user privacy means they can’t harvest their data to make billions of dollars. This sort of tone might fly for a start-up but not one of the largest companies in the world. Doubly true since Meta just identified a huge downside in their prospects and this does nothing to assuage investors. Rather than say “we are looking for ways to continue to provide our services while remaining compliant with privacy laws” and a bunch of marketing speak about it, they throw in the towel and say “boo hoo, if Europe wants privacy, we just can’t have Facebook there.”
The EU doesn't care if Meta gets the data of its users but that there is no possibility to prevent that the intelligence services get them too.
That killed Safe Harbour.
The headline is accurate. Even a company as tin-eared as Meta knows their reputation is deep down in the septic tank, and the threat would be as credible as the black sheriff in Mel Brook's "Blazing Saddles" pointing his gun at his own forehead and saying "Or the N*** gets it's"
Yup, you did. Annual report, page 9, and it backfired.
Everybody knows you won't leave but that's what you suggested point blank. You put this there to put pressure on Europe to surrender its citizens data to the US unconditionally.
Second paragraph: But if we don't get what we want, we will have to consider blah.
I guess it's time for an update to Betteridge's Law: The more emphatically a press-release headline denies something, the more likely it is to be true.
If there is no Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, what will replace it?
Already it seems using Google Analytics is illegal in some countries at EU.
What about Microsoft Teams, Windows 11, etc? How can I prevent those sending any telemetry data etc to outside of EU? Will Microsoft Teams, Windows 11 etc be illegal too?
Seems pretty clear that Facebook is putting this statement out because they're sweating their big stock slide and looking to staunch the bleeding whereever possible. If they were in a stronger position they would be sticking to attempting to strong-arm the EU.
[+] [-] throwaway27727|4 years ago|reply
Point being: to all the commenters saying no one cares, a lot more people care than you think.
[+] [-] IgorPartola|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jon889|4 years ago|reply
Instagram is a bit trickier, but I'm fairly sure people would start making a new one immediately. You could even relatively easily transfer everything and everyone across using the zip you can get thanks to GPDR.
[+] [-] mayankkaizen|4 years ago|reply
As for instagram, things are a bit different. But the way I see it, 1- general population isn't using it. 2- This is not a necessary tool like whatsapp. Something else will fill the void but it will take some considerable time.
[+] [-] cheeze|4 years ago|reply
It's the normal folk that care.
[+] [-] eternauta3k|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] odiroot|4 years ago|reply
I still avoid having any meaningful/private conversations on FB products.
[+] [-] senko|4 years ago|reply
Between this, CLOUD act and EARNIT, why would anyone consider any privacy statement from any US company credible?
[+] [-] tedivm|4 years ago|reply
Our government allows intelligence agencies to spy on everyone, and as a result foreign countries do not trust us. As long as other countries have to worry about US companies sharing data under gag orders those countries will not trust our companies with their data. Nor should they.
[+] [-] paxys|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] scotuswroteus|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Rebelgecko|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] donw|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] keewee7|4 years ago|reply
This fake news reached the top of reddit and trended on Twitter. Both are dominated by users who think of themselves as smarter than the fake news consuming boomers on Facebook.
In my country it was reported by both the tabloids and mainstream media. Only the publicly owned Danmarks Radio (Danish BBC) didn't spread this fake news.
[+] [-] durovo|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fnord77|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] realusername|4 years ago|reply
Funny how they try to spin it like there's some "uncertainty", the regulations are very clear, they just need to apply them.
[+] [-] tobr|4 years ago|reply
How am I supposed to read the cookies policy without clicking or navigating?
[+] [-] ProAm|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dainiusse|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pokot0|4 years ago|reply
People are not even mad about ads, they are mad at the waste of time and general sense that FB brings the worst out of you.
They need to shift their business, changing the landscape (metaverse) will not change anything or trying to convince people that what they offer is great is a long term losing proposition, imh.
[+] [-] nixass|4 years ago|reply
>But the simple reality is that Meta, like many other businesses, organisations and services, relies on data transfers between the EU and the US in order to operate our global services
Yeah.. The reality is you don't really have to transfer anything out of EU in order to keep your service running. Liars
[+] [-] bdonlan|4 years ago|reply
Practically speaking, running FB in a way that doesn't transfer anything out of the EU would involve either:
1. Siloing off the EU facebook, with no contact with the US side
or
2. Building a federated facebook, which transfers across e.g. only the timeline entries US friends are granted view access to
The former would not be well-accepted, as it would cut off communication from e.g. international relatives, and would be a rather large project to launch. The latter would be an even bigger rearchitecture, which would likely take, at a minimum, several years to complete, since it's unlikely this was ever anticipated as being a possibility when FB was originally created.
So, I sympathize with them - while in the long term they might be able to find a solution, in the short-to-medium term, FB would have no choice to stop operating.
[+] [-] jefftk|4 years ago|reply
If a user in Florida tries to view a post by a user in Germany, doesn't the German user's data have to leave the EU?
[+] [-] onphonenow|4 years ago|reply
Look, I realize I'm not an elite hacker news hacker, but how can I as a US user look at my friends posts in germany without them transferring data to me in the US?
What makes this so obviously a lie that such strong language is called for?
[+] [-] kache_|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hashtag-til|4 years ago|reply
One example of that would a mandatory paid option which takes you out of all company data sharing stuff.
I dont use any facebook/Meta related platforms such as facebook, instagram or whatsapp. But it makes me sick seeing people around me addicted to it, due to their shady operation patterns.
[+] [-] mschuster91|4 years ago|reply
Only as long as your users are fine to only talk with people from their "world region cluster". Everyone else would not be able to communicate with, say, family that lives overseas.
[+] [-] justapassenger|4 years ago|reply
Can you explain to me how would you allow communication between EU and USA users without transferring any data out of EU? Expect for putting all the datacenters in EU?
[+] [-] KaiserPro|4 years ago|reply
Ok you would have to make actual legal guarantees that no PII data will _ever_ be processed outside of the EU. given that this effectively means that if you fly out of the EU, or are _routed_ out of the EU, you won't be able to use those services. This is because PII is anything personal to you, and processing means anything that makes decisions, like routing based on IP or username.
This isn't actually a facebook specific problem S3/azure/google and their customers all have the same problem.
but of course yah boo facebook.
[+] [-] stingraycharles|4 years ago|reply
I’m not sure it this is still the case, but assuming it is, wouldn’t that make for a reasonable argument why it would be “impossible” (a.k.a. possible but non-trivial) to keep the data in the EU?
[+] [-] gowld|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xtracto|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pokepim|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] msavara|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Closi|4 years ago|reply
But then in the body of their post...
> EU-US data transfers mechanisms poses a threat to our ability to serve European consumers and operate our business in Europe [and] we have absolutely no desire to withdraw from Europe, of course we don’t, But the simple reality is that Meta relies on data transfers between the EU and the US.
I mean, that sounds like a threat to leave to me? If you can't operate your business in Europe? Talk about mixed messaging and double-speak!
[+] [-] mkl95|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] uncomputation|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] radicaldreamer|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] croes|4 years ago|reply
The EU doesn't care if Meta gets the data of its users but that there is no possibility to prevent that the intelligence services get them too. That killed Safe Harbour.
So blame Patriot Act and Cloud Act not GDPR.
[+] [-] yohannparis|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fmajid|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nokya|4 years ago|reply
Yup, you did. Annual report, page 9, and it backfired.
Everybody knows you won't leave but that's what you suggested point blank. You put this there to put pressure on Europe to surrender its citizens data to the US unconditionally.
Own it.
[+] [-] dsr_|4 years ago|reply
First paragraph: We don't want to blah.
Second paragraph: But if we don't get what we want, we will have to consider blah.
I guess it's time for an update to Betteridge's Law: The more emphatically a press-release headline denies something, the more likely it is to be true.
[+] [-] xet7|4 years ago|reply
Already it seems using Google Analytics is illegal in some countries at EU.
What about Microsoft Teams, Windows 11, etc? How can I prevent those sending any telemetry data etc to outside of EU? Will Microsoft Teams, Windows 11 etc be illegal too?
[+] [-] ferdowsi|4 years ago|reply