[kylecazar]

If you do business in a country you have to operate under that country's laws and regulations, regardless of where you are registered.

Most commonly it's the EU fining American tech for GDPR violations and related privacy shenanigans.

[stavros]

Right, but the UK is saying they'll fine Imgur even after Imgur blocked access. At that point, what tooth does the fine have? "You must pay this fine if you want to, err, nothing I guess"?

[CaptainOfCoit]

They used to have UK legal presence, and planning to move out. The UK is saying something like "crimes done during your presence won't be ignored".

If Imgur never had UK presence, then yeah there would be no teeth. But if you're doing business in a country you can't break the law then leave and expect them to just ignore what you did during that time.

[BeFlatXIII]

…but how enforceable would the fine be? They pull out and have no UK assets to seize.

[pixl97]

Depends.

If you're the US you call planes of out the sky that have representatives and owners of the companies on them.

I'm assuming any leadership of Imgur would want to avoid going to the UK for the rest of eternity.

[Vespasian]

Or they simply decide to pay the fine for the short duration they were not in compliance.

I would do that (after appealing) and be done with it.

[whywhywhywhy]

Ultimately if enough businesses decide it isn't worth the bother than the restrictions will disappear.

[flumpcakes]

Why does it have to be immediately enforceable? Now Imgur have thrown the baby out with the bath water and cannot serve the UK and it leaves a big market for another company to come along and capitalise on that.

American companies are too use to being able to bully their way in America. Some countries do have better consumer protection laws.

[gr3ml1n]

It's not a particularly big market, and given the regulatory hurdles: it's simply not worth doing business with the UK for most companies anymore.

[wizzwizz4]

The regulatory hurdles here are quite small, actually. If COPPA were worded better, Imgur would've been in violation of that, too, from what I can tell of the complaint.

[CaptainOfCoit]

> They pull out and have no UK assets to seize.

How do you expect the "pull out" to happen? They must have had a UK bank account or similar, whose transfers won't get approved as they're trying to escape from criminal prosecution. Or they'll work with the US to ensure responsible individuals are held responsible.

It isn't exactly the first time someone/something commits crime in a country then try to escape, there is lots of ways to work with others on this.

[hollerith]

>they'll work with the US to ensure responsible individuals are held responsible.

I heard here recently during a similar discussion (about 4chan and this same British watchdog agency) that the US does not allow extradition of its citizens for breaking non-US laws if the behavior is legal in the US.

[chrisjj]

> They must have had a UK bank account or similar

How so? None is needed to take revenue from UK-seen ads.

[baobun]

They had more business than that in the UK. UK advertisers as customers for example

[BeFlatXIII]

> Or they'll work with the US to ensure responsible individuals are held responsible.

May US voters put America First over international law.

[KaiserPro]

> they'll fine Imgur even after Imgur blocked access

after they have infringed the data protection laws.

For example, if I get a parking fine, and then move my car. I can't claim that now that I've moved my car, I'm not liable for the previous fine. This is no different.

[tomxor]

There are various international economic laws, treaties and agreements between cooperating countries, whether or not any of them cover this scenario for to US, and whether the US would honour any agreement in the current political climate remains to be seen. But there are mechanisms in place that allow w the UK to reach US companies through each others legal systems to a degree and vice versa, regardless of asset location.

[CaptainOfCoit]

> whether the US would honour any agreement in the current political climate remains to be seen

That this is even a question is bananas to me. Isn't that handled by the judicial system rather than involving politics/the administration? Shouldn't be possible for the US to have a treaty, and there are questions about if the treaty will actually be enforced or not, how could anyone trust the US as a whole for anything if those aren't enforced?

[yorwba]

If Imgur decides they want to make money in the UK after all, and they have an unpaid fine outstanding, that money can be seized to pay off the fine first.

[hayd]

"make money in the UK"

an oxymoron.

[bendigedig]

Just because they've blocked UK users doesn't mean they aren't making revenue from advertising operating via the UK.

[nickslaughter02]

Pay this fine if you don't want to be arrested when entering the UK? Not that they plan to after this...

[KaiserPro]

Imgur isn't a person, and the UK gov isn't ICE.

The whole point of corporations is that the company is liable, not its employees. also the shareholders are only liable for the money they put in, and not anything else.

Convictions in the UK are non-transferable. you can't convict a company, then transfer guilt onto its employees, they need to be tried at the same time.

[baobun]

Are you saying that the Pavel Durov situation wouldn't have been possible in the UK? Seems naive.

[KaiserPro]

> Are you saying that the Pavel Durov situation wouldn't have been possible in the UK

first Durov is a French citizen, so its not like he's immune to french laws

Second france has a totally different legal system to the UK(legal code vs common law)

thirdly, he's the primary owner of telegram, not an employee

Fourthly he was arrested on fraud, money laundering and child porn charges. Those are all criminal charges, not civil(GDPR is mostly Civil, same with the online saftey act, howefver with the OSA "senior managers" could be criminally liable, but again that's for CSAM, of which possession and distribution is a criminal already)

> Seems naive.

I really wish people would actually bother to understand law, because its pretty important. For programmers is much easier, because we are used to reading oddly worded specifically ordered paragraphs to divine logical intent. The law is really similar to programming.

[SAI_Peregrinus]

They're only threatening to fine them for previous violations of the law, not anything after they block access. Blocking access doesn't make the existing fine from when they were doing business in the UK go away, it just prevents future fines.

Whether they can collect the money while Imgur aren't doing business in the UK is a different argument, but it's not particularly controversial that a country can fine a business operating in its jurisdiction for violating that country's laws. Even if those laws are authoritarian bullshit.

[stavros]

Sure, I'm only saying that I don't think there's much they can do by way of enforcement if the company decides to stop doing business there, especially over fines this small (it's not like the UK will push to extradite over this).

[Yokolos]

Honestly, that's the most noteworthy part of this. The EU hasn't pursued any site that just blocks EU access (see any number of US sites than aren't GDPR compliant and I can't access from Europe). The UK is threatening to do something nobody else has really done before. It's crazy, imo, because I can see a whole lot of sites immediately blocking the UK to avoid any potential litigation.

[octo888]

> The UK is threatening to do something nobody else has really done before.

And what is that exactly?

[Ylpertnodi]

>see any number of US sites than aren't GDPR compliant and I can't access from Europe

1. Make sites gdpr compliant by installing an extension or two. 2. Use a vpn to pretend to be not from Europe.

[beardyw]

Thanks. That needs to be in an HN guide somewhere, along with: online services cost money to run so don't be surprised that they need either fees or advertising.

[dreamlayers]

Being accessible over the internet from a country can't be the same as having a physical presence there. Otherwise, anyone putting any content on the internet needs to comply with the laws of every single country.