Amidst all the hollering about TikTok harvesting our data for China, the European Union is fining Meta/Facebook €1.2 billion for handing Europeans’ private data to the American police state:
The European Union slapped Meta with a record $1.3 billion privacy fine Monday and ordered it to stop transferring user data across the Atlantic by October, the latest salvo in a decadelong case sparked by U.S. cybersnooping fears.
The penalty of 1.2 billion euros is the biggest since the EU’s strict data privacy regime took effect five years ago, surpassing Amazon’s 746 million euro fine in 2021 for data protection violations.
…The saga has highlighted the clash between Washington and Brussels over the differences between Europe’s strict view on data privacy and the comparatively lax regime in the U.S., which lacks a federal privacy law. The EU has been a global leader in reining in the power of Big Tech with a series of regulations forcing them to police their platforms more strictly and protect users’ personal information.
An agreement covering EU-U.S. data transfers known as the Privacy Shield was struck down in 2020 by the EU’s top court, which said it didn’t do enough to protect residents from the U.S. government’s electronic prying. Monday’s decision confirmed that another tool to govern data transfers — stock legal contracts — was also invalid.
Brussels and Washington signed a deal last year on a reworked Privacy Shield that Meta could use, but the pact is awaiting a decision from European officials on whether it adequately protects data privacy [Kelvin Chan, “Meta Fined Record $1.3 Billion and Ordered to Stop Sending European User Data to US,” AP, 2023.05.22].
Hmmm… so if Dusty Johnson, Kristi Noem, and other Republicans really want to protect Americans’ data, maybe they need to spend less time banning specific apps and following the lead of our more socialist friends in Europe in establishing rigorous privacy laws to protect all Americans’ data on all online platforms.
But, but, no red-blooded American would use that data, would they? We aren’t like those dastardly Chinese. Giving young Americans all that fun and access to more fun, how dare they!
META and the Interweb already know more about us than any Gubbiment will. Anybody who has done a casual computer search and is then deluged with advertisements (consume, consume, consume!) regarding said search ought to be able to figure that out.