[joeamroo]

This going to be a slippery slope as more governments start to use fines as an alternative type of tax unique to these tech companies. I don't know how Meta/Google can react to these fines (Except the whole opt-in part, but then you have a tradeoff with usability, and people against it usually think that Meta cares about their data outside the aggregate)

[autoexec]

> I don't know how Meta/Google can react to these fines

They'll react by lobbying for fines while also lobbying to limit the amount of those fines. They love the fines. Fines are something they can budget for and can let them violate the laws as long as they are willing to pay the government a fee/toll/bribe. Without fines they might be held meaningfully accountable for their crimes. The last thing they want is to face a risk of ending up in prison the way that you or I most certainly would for repeatedly ignoring the law.

[phyrex]

They’re also an economic moat to stop other networks from emerging. Facebook can pay those fines, $upstart can’t.

[surfingdino]

There is fuck all that those companies need facial recognition for. It is simply not needed and is just a massive invasion of privacy.

[qeternity]

This is such a ridiculous attitude. Facial recognition in my photo albums is hugely useful. It makes searching for people a breeze. Just because you don't have a need for it does not mean it is "simply not needed".

[wil421]

Facebook does not need to use facial recognition on me and we both know they use it for more than tagging photos. If my phone does it I am asked for permission.

[can16358p]

While I get the point, IIRC the point is about using those features _without consent_.

[nox101]

Can I consent to scan my photos if you're in them? I can certainly manually write the names on a physical photo of the people in the photo. That used to be a fairly common practice before digital.

[autoexec]

They need it so that they can spy on you. It's not needed, but many companies are built on surveillance capitalism and an increasing number of companies are using that surveillance to gain a huge advantage over their customers. The more a company knows about you, the easier it is for them to take advantage of you.

There's a lot of money to be made exploiting the most intimate details of our lives. Nobody "needs" that money, but they sure don't want to leave it on the table when the government isn't going to stop them from violating our privacy and then stuffing their pockets with our cash.

[jart]

If there's a lot of money to be made, could you give some concrete examples with that have wide applicability? Ideally I'd like to hear something better than just selling it to an advertiser or data broker.

[surfingdino]

Mass surveillance. Paid for by your tax dollars.

[autoexec]

Examples on how companies and people can make more money by exploiting the massive amounts of private data being collected and sold? I guess that's fair. No company will tell you when they exploit your data to their advantage. It's hidden.

Prices can be set according to the data companies have on you and the assumptions they make using that same data. The price you're asked to pay for something when you shop online isn't always the same price your neighbor would be asked to pay for the exact same item. Lots of potential here too when restaurants don't publicly disclose their prices, but insist that you use a cell phone app or scan a QR code just to see a menu. Your prices don't have to be the same as the person in line behind you for the same foods. Physical retailers have been trying to get this going for a long time.

"For example, ZipRecruiter, an online employment marketplace, indicates that it could increase profits by 84% by experimenting with personalized prices" (https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s41272-019-00224-3)

Fast food chain Wendy's tried to move the needle closer to personalized pricing (aka discriminatory pricing) when they said they were moving to surge pricing and you'd never know how much a burger was going to cost you until you'd already waited in line at the drive through and were told what price you were getting. They backed down due to consumer backlash, but their desire to squeeze every last dime possible out of you by leveraging big data and algorithms is still there.

Hotel/airfare/travel industry has been doing this for a very long time already (https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/mac-users-pa... and https://millionmilesecrets.com/guides/are-airlines-raising-y...)

Health insurance companies want your data so they can charge you more for not moving enough, or because people in your zip code were logged eating more fastfood, or because you've been spending too much on alcohol at the store.

https://www.propublica.org/article/health-insurers-are-vacuu...

https://www.ama-assn.org/practice-management/digital/insurer...

A lot of the tracking we see is explicitly trying to assess traits like intelligence, education level, and mental illnesses including dementia and bipolar disorder.

Here for example is a pizza shop that will "create a profile about you reflecting your preferences, characteristics, psychological trends, predispositions, behavior, attitudes, intelligence, abilities, and aptitudes." You know, just normal pizza shop stuff! (https://pie-tap.com/privacy/)

Companies and scammers alike can easily target uneducated and low intelligence individuals, and machine learning algorithms can detect when bi-polar people are in a manic phase, or what time your ADHD meds usually start to wear off, or when someone with alzheimers starts sundowning and they can jump at those chances to hit people with ads, scams, and manipulations when they think their target is weakest/most confused/most impulsive. Even without a diagnosis your mental health is a huge business opportunity for the person willing to exploit it (https://www.politico.com/news/2022/01/28/suicide-hotline-sil...)

The data being collected on you is increasingly used for really big things like if you get a job, or if your rental lease agreement gets approved, but it's also used for really trivial things like determining how long to leave you on hold when you call a company (https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/04/business/secret-consumer-...)

Companies aren't collecting huge amounts of facts about you and your life because it's fun for them. They pay a lot of money to purchase, collect, store, maintain, backup, and scrutinize all that data, and they do it because it's making them money. Almost always, their increased profits come at your expense.

[jart]

All the things you mentioned, like discrimination, sound like ways that companies safeguard against losing money, not earning it like I asked. They all also sound like money losers to me in practice. For example, if someone refuses to hire me because they found out something unsavory about me from a data broker, then they're really only hurting themselves. If someone tries to charge me more because they think I can afford it, then they're going to lose my business or get bad PR on X once I realize I'm being treated unfairly. The best you could probably argue is that preventing corporations from having knowledge about people will protect the most vulnerable members of our society who can't fight or fend for themselves and are willing to tolerate being treated poorly.

[freejazz]

Sure, if it doesn't bother you personally, it must not actually be a social problem.

[autoexec]

> All the things you mentioned, like discrimination, sound like ways that companies safeguard against losing money, not earning it like I asked.

A distinction without a difference? A company that can raise their prices for you because they know (or think) that you can afford the price hike isn't safeguarding them, it's just screwing you out of money. How would you feel if you got an awesome 20% raise at work, only to find that the next day the top 10 things you most frequently buy at the store were all suddenly 20% more when you went to pay for them. Why shouldn't a loaf of bread cost a percentage of your total income?

> if someone refuses to hire me because they found out something unsavory about me from a data broker, then they're really only hurting themselves.

I could agree that it might not be smart for them to lose candidates based on random crap dug out of a background search, but it happens and however dumb it is for the company, you would still be out that job. They'll never tell you why you didn't get hired. You just get ghosted.

> If someone tries to charge me more because they think I can afford it, then they're going to lose my business or get bad PR on X once I realize I'm being treated unfairly.

All the recent inflation shows that companies can get away with arbitrarily raising prices a whole lot as long as they all do it around the same time. Have you been boycotting them all recently? I've gone out of my way to avoid eggs associated with Cal-Maine Foods over price gouging (https://www.newsweek.com/egg-producers-accused-price-gouging...) but it's not been easy. Not every brand I see in stores advertises itself as being related to them. Boycotts are growing more difficult thanks to the massive consolidation of our food industry (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2021/...).

Most of the time when you end up paying more because of big data you'll never be told that. All of this is almost totally hidden from consumers. You'll just be charged more or get a bill that seems higher and you won't be told why. You're very likely already paying more for some things because of big data. Same with store policies. You ask a store what their return policy and they'll tell you one thing while the next person who asks gets told something different. You can't feel cheated or even like you're being treated special because your good consumer score is so high because you don't even know there are multiple policies in effect depending on who asks.

I'd be willing to bet that a lot of people on twitter have complained about companies like comcast, at&t, tyson foods, facebook, 3m, monsanto, etc, but what has it accomplished? Many of the most wealthy and powerful companies in the US are also the most hated by the public. They don't have good reputations to protect. They just don't have to care if you like them or not.

> The best you could probably argue is that preventing corporations from having knowledge about people will protect the most vulnerable members of our society who can't fight or fend for themselves and are willing to tolerate being treated poorly.

It would protect all of us. No one can "fend for themselves" and everyone is being treated poorly. You have been being treated poorly already. You will continue to be treated poorly until it hurts a companies profits to treat you badly. Right now, they're not just getting away with it, they are looking for ways to screw you over even more than they are already and in new and innovative ways using resources unlike anything you'll ever have. It's highly asymmetric warfare where consumers are divided into buckets and ultimately conquered.

[Zambyte]

I do hope informed consent is a slippery slope. That would be stellar.

[ta1243]

> I don't know how Meta/Google can react to these fines

How about by not breaking the law?

[_trampeltier]

Maybe, but already two years ago, if you read the fine print for ex. by buying a ticket for Cirque de Soleil you accept they can use your face on the video for ai training.

[lokar]

I went to a show last week. I did not buy the tickets or even see one. I did not agree to anything.

[_trampeltier]

But somebody did buy the ticket for you. Today you accept a lot when buying a ticket. Mostly you accept also to things like, they can use your picture on commercials / media and so on. Just the next time, take the time and read the full EULA when buying a ticket from a large event.

[prussian]

Isn't this a case of shrinkwrap contracts? Use (viewing) is acceptance? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shrinkwrap_(contract_law)

[lokar]

Except there you were shown the agreement and had to click or whatever.

For event tickets, you are not even made aware there is an “agreement “

[toomuchtodo]

This is great news until privacy legislation catches up. Big Tech should be fearful they'll step on a mine financilly.

[autoexec]

Oh yeah, big tech is going to be shaking in their boots. I'm sure Meta is really crying about the 1.4 billion they lost while they're rolling around in the 134 billion in revenue they made last year. They've even got a nice easy payment plan which allows them to invest and make money on the $225 million they're going to be paying each year from 2025 to 2028.

[toomuchtodo]

Policy and progress takes time, but does happen.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/07/30/seante-...

[autoexec]

We need protections in law, but I can't say I'm a big fan of KOSA. It not only fails to address the problem for anyone other than children, but it enables a lot of harm. Censorship isn't the solution. Ending the buying and selling of personal data, outlawing ads that are targeted to individuals as opposed to targeting content/context, and requiring companies to apply the same policies and prices for all of their customers no matter who that customer is, or how much money that customer has in the bank would be a better approach.

[toomuchtodo]

Sometimes censorship is the solution, because humans are tricky and every human comes with their own baggage. Not always of course, but there is always nuance.

[xkcd1963]

We are not always going forward..

[mulmen]

Revenue isn’t profit. This is gradeschool finance. Meta’s net income in 2023 was $39 billion. $1.4 billion is 3.5% of worldwide income for one US state. It’s an unsustainable penalty for Meta if more states and jurisdictions issue similar penalties.

[autoexec]

> Revenue isn’t profit.

No, and I didn't say that it was. Reported revenue was just the data Meta has made available. Unless I've missed it somewhere, they don't explicitly state exactly how much profit they made last year. I think it's reasonable to assume that it was several times more than the 1.4 billion dollar fine though, which is really the point. If Meta/facebook makes even just tens of billions in profit, 1.4 billion could easily be a sustainable penalty. The more years they are hit with a fine that size, and the more other states start demanding their cut of the action too, the less sustainable it becomes, probably, but for all we know paying this 1.4 billion fine (over several years) to Texas could actually be (or end up being) profitable for meta.

How much money did they make off the data they've been collecting and abusing since 2011? How much money will they make in the future from what they learned by abusing that facial recognition data for nearly 15 years? If it ever amounts to more than the fine, or if other incentives make it justifiable to shareholders then Meta is better off for having broken the law.

[mulmen]

> Unless I've missed it somewhere, they don't explicitly state exactly how much profit they made last year.

They state this in their financial reports and it is readily available on financial news websites. I’m not sure how you found revenue without also finding net income (aka profit).

Type “meta profit” into a search engine and click the first result. This immediately gave me the answer in Bing, DuckDuckGo, Google, Kagi, and Yahoo.

[autoexec]

the first result in Duckduckgo took me here (https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/26/technology/meta-earnings-...) which is paywalled but what is readable gives a number for a single quarter, but not for the whole of last year.

Google takes me here (https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/technology/meta-po...) where it's the same story

You mentioned Kagi, so I thought I'd try asking kagi's AI search: "how much did Meta make in profits last year"

That gave me:

According to the available information:

In 2023, Meta Platforms reported annual revenue of $134.902 billion, which was a 15.69% increase from 2022.12 However, the information does not explicitly state Meta's profit for 2023.

The closest relevant information is that in 2022, Meta's total operating profit declined from $46.8 billion in 2021 to $28.9 billion.3 Additionally, in Q4 2023, Meta reported revenue of $40.11 billion, which was a 25% year-over-year increase.4

So while we don't have the exact profit figure for 2023, the available data suggests Meta's profits were likely substantial, though potentially lower than the previous year's $46.8 billion.3

[freejazz]

> I don't know how Meta/Google can react to these fines

They could start by not breaking the law...

[jonas21]

Or worse, to target specific companies that the government doesn't like for whatever reason (arguably, this is already happening in the EU).

[tomComb]

Now we're getting to the real point of this.

It is usually whatever company isn't friendly enough to the current government.

In Canada, it is any company that dares to compete with the telecom companies.

[tossandthrow]

How is this happening in the EU?

[can16358p]

That's EU's whole weaponized business model for lacking in technological development (I mean the "big tech" not tech in general though).

[immibis]

Have you considered the Occam's razor possibility that Europe genuinely doesn't want these companies doing business the way they do, rather than it being a conspiracy to increase government revenue? Remember, it's often illegal to take a photograph in public in Germany, and for this reason Google Street View is decades old.

[can16358p]

I of course considered it. If they genuinely think that way, it's even worse IMHO.

If it was just a tactic it could at least have a sensible (though evil) explanation.

[consteval]

I think if people of a country have a standard for how companies should act that's fair game. If they don't want companies to do that stuff than the companies leaving or crying isn't a bad thing, it's accomplishing the goal.

[immibis]

If I understood correctly, you think people genuinely wanting privacy, and preferring to have more privacy and no Facebook rather than less privacy and more Facebook, is inherently worse than actual corruption. This says more about you than about the EU.

[can16358p]

This has nothing to do with Facebook or a specific entity. This is about accessing and capturing already available public data (e.g. someone's appearance in public).

Just like ad hominem framing tells more about you than me.