[dheera]

> Even if these are US companies they need to comply

Only if you have an office in the EU.

Not any more than US companies need to comply with arbitrary Chinese laws, or Japanese companies need to comply with arbitrary Saudi Arabian laws. Why does the EU have special status in being able to impose laws on the US?

The EU can feel free to block the website if they don't like it. (But we know their citizens would throw a riot if they started censoring the internet, sshhh...)

However, independently of GDPR, I agree that it's wrong and that you shouldn't be saving contact information by deception. You'd lose me as a customer if you did that.

[Nursie]

I think it goes further than office location, if you do business in the EU at all you want to watch out.

Of course the main problem with the GDPR is that it's so far not really been enforced, so people feel free to contravene it at will.

[dheera]

I suppose you could also decide to either

- (a) not do business in the EU, but leave your website accessible throughout the world. It's upto the EU to block it if they hate it

- (b) invite people from the EU to do business with you on US soil, where they would be subject to US laws instead of EU laws