[HN Gopher] Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with EUR530M fine...
___________________________________________________________________
Irish privacy watchdog hits TikTok with EUR530M fine over data
transfers to China
Author : Alifatisk
Score : 320 points
Date : 2025-05-02 10:33 UTC (12 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (apnews.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (apnews.com)
| zelphirkalt wrote:
| Is that massive? Meh ... Probably not. Probably still within cost
| of business range, right?
| petesergeant wrote:
| 2% of annual revenue, and 6 months to comply or presumably
| further sanctions coming
| petesergeant wrote:
| > Grahn said TikTok has "has never received a request for
| European user data from the Chinese authorities, and has never
| provided European user data to them."
|
| lol, ok. Chinese intelligence services must be completely asleep
| at the wheel (doubtful)
| DarkWiiPlayer wrote:
| I am convinced they would absolutely tell the truth if they
| _had_ handed over any data to the Chinese government and would
| never just lie about it to protect their business interests /s
| doix wrote:
| I find the exact wording believable enough. There was never a
| request, the Chinese government just accesses the data they
| need without a request.
| hengheng wrote:
| Meaning that there is an intermediary?
| lukan wrote:
| I rather think they don't need to request, but have a direct
| line into the servers.
| feverzsj wrote:
| China government literally forces direct integration into
| every messaging and financial service. If you talk shit about
| the government in wechat, the police will call you the next
| minute.
| diggan wrote:
| Fun fact: This is also why iCloud in China isn't actually
| run by Apple at all, but by a company called AIPO Cloud
| (Guizhou) Technology Co. Ltd, and the Terms of
| Service/Privacy Policy is different from the rest of
| iCloud.
| trollbridge wrote:
| Yes, because it was a command not a request.
| udev4096 wrote:
| Whoever cares about privacy would certainly stay away from
| TokTok. This is just absurd. Ban the app already
| lukan wrote:
| "Ban the app already"
|
| And FB, Insta, Google, Youtube, ..?
|
| The only difference with TikTok is that it is based in china.
| seydor wrote:
| The relationship between EU and US is certainly closer than
| China
| lukan wrote:
| It is. But if a US company like Paypal decides to blacklist
| me for whatever reason (data shared from other companies) -
| the consequences for me are way higher.
| seydor wrote:
| that's because common interests are closer
| _Algernon_ wrote:
| Questionable whether that will still be true in 4 years. At
| least China can still be expected to operate rationally.
| graemep wrote:
| Really? A nice rational genocide or two?
|
| China is an expansionist dictatorship. It would be
| ridiculous to suggest it is more trustworthy than the US.
|
| The US is actually acting rationally IMO. People just
| look at headlines and do not dig into the reasons. You
| might not agree with the reasoning, but it is not
| irrational. For example the tariffs clearly follow from
| arguments made by Trump's appointees (such as Bessent and
| Marin) even before the election, and definitely before
| being appointed.
| aurareturn wrote:
| Really? A nice rational genocide or two?
|
| Huh? So China dealing with an internal extremist Islam
| problem is a genocide?
|
| But the US funding/providing weapons to Israel in the
| Gaza war is not a genocide? China is an
| expansionist dictatorship. It would be ridiculous to
| suggest it is more trustworthy than the US.
|
| The US has bombed 29 countries since WW2. How many has
| China bombed? The US has installed dictators in foreign
| countries, influenced countless democratic elections. How
| many has China installed?
| kubb wrote:
| You're getting downvoted, but the US foreign policy is
| more hawkish than China's by any measure.
|
| Internally I'm inclined to believe that it can be hell on
| earth for minorities.
| _Algernon_ wrote:
| They are getting downvoted because they are arguing
| against a straw man.
|
| >But the US funding/providing weapons to Israel in the
| Gaza war is not a genocide?
|
| Nowhere did the comment they replied to claim that the
| war in Gaza isn't a genocide.
| kubb wrote:
| You're right, but if you admit that, it's hard to claim
| that China is more brutal than the US, and therefore less
| trustworthy.
| aurareturn wrote:
| Nowhere did the comment they replied to claim that the
| war in Gaza isn't a genocide.
|
| The author I responded to thinks China is worse in terms
| of genocides/killing people than the US. Therefore, the
| US is more "trustworthy". I gave examples countering
| that.
|
| The US has always dealt with Islam extremists with bombs
| and killings. China is doing it through education camps.
| No, the camps probably aren't pleasant. It's a hard
| problem that requires a hard solution. But to me, China's
| way seems way more humane. Viewed in another lens,
| perhaps China deserves a Nobel Peace prize for their
| camps instead of being labeled as a genocide.
| echoangle wrote:
| By that viewpoint, everything is rational. If someone
| hears voices in their head that tell them to shoot up a
| school, there's also some reasoning that may lead them to
| actually do it. That doesn't mean it's rational. Can you
| give an example of behavior you consider to be
| irrational?
| graemep wrote:
| No, saying a particular thing is rational is very
| different from claiming everything is rational.
|
| People will make the wildest claims about Trumps'
| polices, even people who should know better. A good
| example is Jeffrey Sachs saying Trump's policies should
| would fail an economics class - but one of the people
| devising Trump's economic polices got a PhD from Harvard
| while Sachs was a professor there!
| rfoo wrote:
| You know, sometimes I _really_ wonder, if Uyghurs aren 't
| white, are US/EU still going to make stretch to call the
| human right abuse during China's version of "counter-
| terrorism war" in Xinjiang "genocide" or not.
| surgical_fire wrote:
| > China is an expansionist dictatorship. It would be
| ridiculous to suggest it is more trustworthy than the US.
|
| China never threatened to annex portions of EU countries,
| unlike the US.
|
| If anything, China is definitely more reliable, as its
| only disputes with EU are on trade, not anything
| ideological or that threatens the integrity of each
| party.
| master-lincoln wrote:
| EU has issues with human rights violations regularly
| happening in China. China has even sanctioned European
| politicians voicing critique. Only recently some of those
| sanctions were lifted by China so they can negotiate
| trade agreements with the EU.
|
| China might be more reliable than the US right now, but
| ideologically they are further away from the EU than the
| US I think.
| aurareturn wrote:
| EU has issues with human rights violations regularly
| happening in China. China has even sanctioned European
| politicians voicing critique.
|
| Does China sanction France for its role in suppressing
| parts of Africa?[0] In the video comments, a lot of
| French citizens never even heard about it. That tells you
| that the French government is also hiding a ton of
| atrocities it's committing to its citizens, right?
|
| Why is the EU judging when they still violate human
| rights themselves?
|
| I think when Europeans criticize China for not having the
| same values as them, they should learn some history about
| how European powers tried to tear China apart and take
| advantage of it. Start with the photo of Austria-Hungary,
| France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United States
| and the United Kingdom forces inside the Forbidden
| City.[1]
|
| Perhaps China not having the same values of European
| powers is a good thing in terms of overall peace?
|
| I would love to hear from EU citizens on why they should
| be the judge of all human moral values when their
| countries have arguably done more collectively to disturb
| the peace of others in the last 300 years than any
| country in Asia.
|
| [0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiD24uEvY1U
|
| [1]https://images.squarespace-
| cdn.com/content/v1/50adfa2ae4b0cc...
| master-lincoln wrote:
| I don't think it's valid to say you can only criticize
| somebody if you are doing better on that front. We should
| all watch and criticize other countries so humanity can
| improve.
|
| > Perhaps China not having the same values of European
| powers is a good thing in terms of overall peace?
|
| I fail to see why that could be the case. Why would
| different values support peace?
|
| > I would love to hear from EU citizens on why they
| should be the judge of all human moral values when their
| countries have arguably done more collectively to disturb
| the peace of others in the last 300 years than any
| country in Asia.
|
| Again you assume one is only able to voice concerns if
| you are doing better in a certain area. You are also
| treating different governments of different times in a
| country as a single entity. FYI: In most countries there
| is more than one party in government over time and
| parties have different values.
| aurareturn wrote:
| I don't think it's valid to say you can only criticize
| somebody if you are doing better on that front. We should
| all watch and criticize other countries so humanity can
| improve.
|
| I think it's valid. Fix yourself first. Telling someone
| else to stop doing something you're doing yourself is
| meaningless - especially when the EU is trying to
| position as the morally superior entity.
| I fail to see why that could be the case. Why would
| different values support peace?
|
| Because we've seen what happens when Europe has more
| power than the rest of the world. It wasn't pretty for
| the rest of the world. Let's see what China can do.
| Again you assume one is only able to voice concerns if
| you are doing better in a certain area. You are also
| treating different governments of different times in a
| country as a single entity. FYI: In most countries there
| is more than one party in government over time and
| parties have different values.
|
| Yes, I'm assuming that. EU wants to be a leader. EU wants
| to sanction countries they think is doing something
| wrong. So why doesn't EU sanction itself first?
| throw310822 wrote:
| There is an actual genocide going on in Palestine, with
| two million people trapped in a strip of land and bombed
| and starved until they consent to emigrate- and the EU is
| silent and failed to sanction Israel in any way. How can
| you _seriously_ talk about "issues with human rights
| violations"? It's ridiculous.
| snapcaster wrote:
| unless they happen in Gaza right?
| dlachausse wrote:
| No, not EU countries, but they did annex Tibet, several
| islands in the South China Sea, and they have every
| intention of invading Taiwan in the future. Then there's
| the belt and road initiative, which is essentially
| neocolonialism.
|
| Edit: I also forgot to mention their human rights
| violations with regards to the Uyghurs and other minority
| groups.
| surgical_fire wrote:
| Eh, US is threatening to annex Greenland, part of Panama
| and Canada, which may be more relevant for EU actually.
|
| I can produce quite a list of human rights violations
| from the US too, if we are playing this game.
|
| I was not trying to paint China as a happy friendly
| country. I was just saying that right now China is less
| of a threat to EU than the US, when those in power in the
| US numerous times voiced their ideological hatred for
| Europe
| _Algernon_ wrote:
| The US is already unlawfully sending people to foreign
| prisons. The US has over decades worked with
| dictatorships where it benefited them. The US has
| repeatedly and systematically overthrown legitimate
| democratic governments in favor of dictatorships where it
| benefited them. The US is founded on genocide of native
| Americans. The US has time and time again invaded
| countries for their resources. The US is the only country
| that has used nuclear weapons in war ( _twice_ ).
|
| Don't pretend that the US is some paragon of virtue.
|
| China talks big about Taiwan but actions speak louder
| than words. So far I see very little action from China
| and a lot from the US spanning a century of aggression.
| lukan wrote:
| "So far I see very little action from China"
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_the_
| Peo...
|
| I would argue with them getting stronger, they might get
| more active.
|
| Their fish trawlers behave pretty agressive worldwide.
| And they are part of their military.
| _Algernon_ wrote:
| Fair point but US still comes out on top:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_the_
| Uni...
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_the_
| Uni...
| lkramer wrote:
| China is definitely not a fun neighbour if you're The
| Philippines.
|
| One of the big problem with the US suddenly becoming so
| adversarial (whether rationally so or not) is that the
| choice for Europe may be to choose between the lesser of
| 2 evils, which in Europe's eyes could very well end up
| being China. China at least tend to behave consistently
| and predictably over a long term. The US radically
| changing behaviour every 4 years, and now even multiple
| times within a 100 day span, is just really really
| difficult to deal with. Not to mention making direct
| threats to European countries and generally working to
| oppose European interests.
| LYK-love wrote:
| I happen to live in China right now and am using a VPN. I
| find your comments to be fundamentally incorrect. I live
| here more than 20 years and can't find any information
| about genocide, and I have a lot of (I suppose you are
| talking about) Xinjiang friends. Yes, there are
| extremists in Xinjiang with foreign funding. And The the
| government prepares extreme religious individuals for
| modern society. This process involves learning Chinese
| and learning basic skills to have a job. If people really
| died there, why we Chinese people don't know it? I mean I
| can literally drive to Xinjiang to check these
| information.
|
| If you don't believe my words and still think people are
| oppressed in Xinjiang or whatever place, please apply a
| Chinese visa and visit here. If your visit is short-term,
| then a visa is not even needed.
|
| Your narratives about China reflect self-projection.
| Western historical treatment of minorities doesn't mirror
| our approach. It's like saying Chinese people are too
| oppressed to afford bread or are forced to pick cotton--
| ignoring that bread isn't a Chinese staple and cotton-
| picking doesn't carry any other cultural meanings here.
|
| By the way, if I said capitalism makes Americans too poor
| to eat rice, wouldn't you find that ridiculous? I'm sure
| you would, because you guys generally don't eat rice.
| This projection is exactly what your views about China
| represent.
| dlachausse wrote:
| > I live here more than 20 years and can't find any
| information about genocide
|
| China's persecution of the Uyghur people is considered by
| many to cross the line into genocide...
|
| https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-22278037
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Uyghurs_in_C
| hin...
|
| https://www.nbcnews.com/news/china/china-guilty-genocide-
| cri...
|
| https://www.ushmm.org/genocide-
| prevention/countries/china/ch...
| lukan wrote:
| "Yes, there are extremists in Xinjiang with foreign
| funding."
|
| Radical islmaists are definitely a thing, but don't you
| think, the chinese government considers anyone extremist
| not ok with one party rule?
|
| (I don't expect a honest answer, since you need a vpn to
| communicate)
|
| And that you don't find information and that your chinese
| friends don't find know about controversal topic, then
| this is rather a obvious sign to me, that chinese
| censorship is working.
| immibis wrote:
| Most genocides are rational. They occur when the
| genociders sincerely believe they're being attacked by
| the victims.
| seydor wrote:
| We should remember that Donald Trump is not the only
| american
| _Algernon_ wrote:
| Donald Trump is not the only American but he is the only
| American that matters for foreign policy, considering
| that checks and balances that are supposed to reign him
| in have been shown to have no teeth.
| master-lincoln wrote:
| Yeah, but it seems like half of the other US Americans
| want him to represent them. So it's not unlikely that
| whoever comes after Trump acts like him too.
| yupyupyups wrote:
| >rationally
|
| Predictably, not rationally.
| drodgers wrote:
| Yes.
| aloisdg wrote:
| Yes to ban? if so, yes.
| nextworddev wrote:
| And that's a very big difference
| yupyupyups wrote:
| Yes, ban those too.
|
| We need services that respect user privacy and are not a
| longterm security threat.
| Retr0id wrote:
| _Everyone_ deserves privacy.
| prof-dr-ir wrote:
| 'massive' -- by which standards?
|
| It is high time we got used to companies being fined a reasonable
| fraction of their revenue. And TikTok's global revenue last year
| alone was estimated at $20 billion to $26 billion [1].
|
| [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/17/technology/tiktok-ban-
| byt...
| AlchemistCamp wrote:
| What bearing does their global revenue have on what Ireland has
| any jurisdiction to fine them? I'm not a fan or user of TikTok,
| but what they earn on other continents is none of Ireland's
| business.
| dmos62 wrote:
| These are global companies. Why pretend you're only dealing
| with a small fragment of it? I don't see a reason to be
| overly conservative.
| _Algernon_ wrote:
| They choose to operate here. Of course it is Ireland's
| business.
| DrScientist wrote:
| The Irish regulator is acting on behalf of the EU as TikTok
| European head quarters are in Ireland.
|
| And in terms of jurisdiction - it's a bit like you visiting
| Ireland on holiday and committing a crime - and then arguing
| they have no jurisdiction over you as you are only there for
| 2 weeks.
| _Algernon_ wrote:
| A more apt comparison is that you get a fine for speeding
| abroad, and argue that you don't have to pay it because you
| earned that money in your home country.
|
| It's ridiculous.
| AlchemistCamp wrote:
| Sure, it's fine for Ireland to punish someone for a crime
| committed in Ireland, but my question was about what
| bearing revenue earned on other continents was any business
| of Ireland's.
|
| A more accurate version of your analogy would be Ireland
| choosing to punish a tourist for littering with a
| dramatically higher penalty than native Irish would face
| based on their New York salary.
| relistan wrote:
| Because, like many other tech companies, Tiktok is
| funneling most of their global revenue through Ireland
| where the corporate tax rate is very low. I don't know
| the specifics of the mechanism used by Tiktok. But, most
| companies do this by registering all of their IP through
| their Irish company and then paying licensing fees to the
| Irish entity that just happen to be all of their profit
| abroad. This is why the Irish regulator punches way above
| its weight globally and is why it is often the entry
| point for EU regulation on foreign firms.
| AlchemistCamp wrote:
| Maybe Alibaba is a better example. Why should Alibaba
| increasing its global revenue through growth in the
| Chinese market mean that Ireland should fine it more? If
| it's because earnings in Ireland or even maybe the entire
| EU went up, then I can see the justification. But if
| Alibaba's revenue is going up because of Alibaba
| improving logistics within China, why should Ireland get
| anything for that?
| relistan wrote:
| In Tiktok's case it's because the revenue is actually
| flowing through Ireland.
|
| EDIT: here's more about the general mechanism I'm
| referring to https://archive.is/0hcAK
| graemep wrote:
| Ireland was acting on behalf of the EU, so at the very least
| the fine should be substantial relative to EU revenues.
|
| The law does say global revenues, and I think that is a
| deterrent to treating fines as just a cost of doing business.
| AlchemistCamp wrote:
| Yeah, relative to EU revenues would be fairly reasonable.
| noirscape wrote:
| It's a case involving their European customers.
|
| If you do business in Europe, there's a bunch of (good!)
| privacy regulations you have to comply with. One of these is
| that you're not allowed to transfer the data to a
| jurisdiction that doesn't follow equivalent protections to
| the GDPR[0]. TikTok transferred European user data to their
| Chinese servers, which is a pretty obvious no-go, since the
| Chinese government is an authoritarian watchdog that
| inherently can't guarantee these protections (as the GDPR
| also applies to transferring data to the government.)
|
| Ireland has jurisdiction because the EU offers something
| called the "one stop shop" concept, where a foreign company
| can declare that they have EU headquarters in a specific
| member state, and from that point on the only EU regulations
| they have to directly worry about are how they're implemented
| in that country in specific[1]. Every major tech company is
| therefore in Ireland because the country is small enough to
| essentially steamroll local politicians with lobby money,
| leading to very lax enforcement until the EU starts applying
| pressure.[2]
|
| [0]: This also causes issues with data transfers to the US,
| and in the most extreme interpretation, makes it so that you
| probably can't do business with both Europe and the US at the
| same time in the first place. This is because of the CLOUD
| act, which goes across jurisdictions and is something the US
| government can use to compel any service provider to hand
| over data.
|
| [1]: Of course, a country can still have it's own laws that a
| company can run afoul of on top of that.
|
| [2]: Other countries with this issue are Luxembourg (Fintech
| companies love Luxembourg because they can just hire all the
| good lawyers, meaning you can't negotiate legal disputes
| there effectively) and the Netherlands (which is a EU-based
| tax haven for large corporations that aren't in either
| sector.)
| docdeek wrote:
| Do you know if there is a reason they would not domicile in
| Malta? It's an EU Member State, English speaking, and if
| buying off politicians in Ireland is easy, it must be
| easier in Malta with a population of only 550,000 people.
| noirscape wrote:
| My guess is just physical/lazy reasons. Before this, they
| were homed in the UK, whose special arrangements meant
| that they could avoid a lot of EU regulations that way.
|
| Then Brexit happened and they just moved to the nearest
| available option.
| diffuse_l wrote:
| I'm pretty sure Ireland was home to a lot of global
| corporations EU headquarters way before brexit...
| rsynnott wrote:
| Yeah, this is pretty ahistorical; most multinational tech
| companies already had their EU headquarters in Ireland
| before Brexit. A lot of companies _did_ move operations
| from the UK to Ireland (or sometimes the Netherlands) as
| a result of Brexit, but it was mostly financial and
| insurance companies (plus some pharma, medical devices
| etc), and those didn't generally move their headquarters
| if they weren't already in Ireland.
| trollbridge wrote:
| Malta is no longer trying to be an "offshore" destination
| with lax regulations.
| jdietrich wrote:
| Malta is simply too small to accommodate the European
| headquarters of a major tech company. It's not enough to
| just put a brass plaque on a door - you need to actually
| run your EU operations primarily in that country. Meta
| and Google have thousands of staff in Ireland.
|
| Malta is (along with Gibraltar) a preferred destination
| for gambling operators.
| fidotron wrote:
| > Every major tech company is therefore in Ireland because
| the country is small enough to essentially steamroll local
| politicians with lobby money
|
| No, it's because Ireland had a very low corporation tax
| with the strategy of becoming the preferred HQ for foreign
| companies in the EU.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporation_tax_in_the_Republ
| i...
|
| "By 2018, Ireland had received the most U.S. SS Corporate
| tax inversions in history, and Apple was over one-fifth of
| Irish GDP. Academics rank Ireland as the largest tax haven;
| larger than the Caribbean tax haven system."
| rsynnott wrote:
| > Every major tech company is therefore in Ireland because
| the country is small enough to essentially steamroll local
| politicians with lobby money
|
| It's more about taxes and an efficient well-understood
| legal system (similar to the Delaware advantage on the
| latter). While the DPC used to be kinda useless, it has
| somewhat gotten its act together, and today issues most of
| the big GDPR fines. If you were trying to specifically
| avoid GDPR scrutiny, you'd locate elsewhere.
| andrepd wrote:
| A fine is supposed to be a deterrent to illegal behaviour.
| Much like a fine of 100EUR for speeding is unlikely to
| dissuade someone driving a Ferrari, a fine directed towards a
| company needs to be proportional to that company's revenue,
| or else it will just be factored as a cost of doing business.
|
| How much value did tiktok derive from flaunting these privacy
| laws? It's not entirely unlikely that it was less than
| 530MEUR.
| bbarnett wrote:
| Absurd. Damages need to be inline with 'how to force
| corrective behaviour'. They are to be designed to FORCE the
| company to change how they are behaving.
|
| If their global revenue was $1000, and the local revenue is
| $1, fining them $0.10 isn't going to help much.
| netdevphoenix wrote:
| If you breach a regulation or commit a crime in a
| jurisdiction, your behaviour in other jurisdictions WILL be
| considered during your judicial process.
| trollbridge wrote:
| Ireland's business is whatever Ireland wants it to be, if
| TikTok wants the pleasure of being allowed to operate in
| Ireland jurisdictions.
|
| And yes, everything a multi-billion dollar company does is
| indeed the government's business - and the people's business.
| We have a right to regulate them as we see fit.
| curiousObject wrote:
| > _Ireland 's business is whatever Ireland wants it to be_
|
| Ireland offers a favorable tax and regulatory environment,
| within the EU, so this punishment is not only Ireland's
| business. It represents the EU.
| scott_w wrote:
| Why not? A country can, for the most part, set whatever level
| of fines they want within law. You can make an argument about
| the practicality of any given punishment but that's separate
| from the morality (which, from the tone of your comment, I
| assume is where you're coming from).
| AlchemistCamp wrote:
| Sure. A country can set "whatever level of fines they want
| within law". For example, Russia assessed a
| $20,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 against
| Google. https://edition.cnn.com/2024/10/31/tech/google-
| fines-russia/...
|
| At the base level, I suppose my point was about morality,
| but my intent was about rationality. A country can write
| laws that it can take all the money a company earns across
| the entire globe, but it's not a very reasonable position,
| IMO.
| rsynnott wrote:
| These secrets are contained deep within the article, which of
| course it is highly improper to read on this here orange
| website:
|
| > The Irish national watchdog serves as TikTok's lead data
| privacy regulator in the 27-nation EU because the company's
| European headquarters is based in Dublin.
|
| This is likely under the GDPR, whose penalties are based on
| global revenue. If TikTok doesn't like it, it is of course
| free to cease activity in Europe (strictly speaking the GDPR
| also protects European citizens outside of Europe, but in
| practice if a company doesn't operate in Europe there is
| little that the EU can do).
| charlieyu1 wrote:
| EUR530M is enough to be a deterrent under normal circumstances.
|
| Now we all know it is not normal but then it should be handled
| with a lawsuit/law enforcement. Don't think any organisation is
| going to do that far alone.
| lolinder wrote:
| To hurt enough to be worth changing the fines don't have to be
| a fraction of their global revenue, they have to be
| significantly more than the benefit gained from the illegal
| behavior. According to that article TikTok made $10B of that
| $20B in the US alone, which puts a cap on their European
| revenue of $10B (likely significantly less because this ignores
| Brazil and Indonesia, which according to the linked article are
| its largest markets by user count).
|
| EUR530m is ~$600m, so this fine is _at least_ 6% of their
| relevant 2024 revenue, and likely substantially higher. I don
| 't know enough about their business practices to know if that's
| a big enough chunk to make up for what they gain by cheating,
| but it's definitely not a wrist slap.
| lukeschlather wrote:
| The thing is, TikTok is not accused of directly profiting off
| of this, they are accused of operating as part of the Chinese
| espionage apparatus. Assuming that this is the case, TikTok
| is going to be happy to continue paying fines as long as they
| break even worldwide. And the US is making no serious
| attempts to rein in this sort of behavior so they've got all
| that US profit to use.
| TechDebtDevin wrote:
| I've still yet to see any evidence that TikTok is anymore
| of a spying/espionage tool than your average app on any
| device. But I guess if people just keep repeating that It
| will make it true.
|
| Never mind, I forgot, Western Intelligence orgs are trusted
| sources of truth and definitely wouldn't spy on me or lie
| to me. My Bad!
| SequoiaHope wrote:
| I don't think anyone credible is taking the position that
| Meta and Google and Microsoft don't spy for the US
| government but TikTok does spy for the Chinese
| government. This is simply a transparent double standard.
| BobaFloutist wrote:
| It's only a double standard if you consider the Chinese
| government to be functionallly identical to the US
| government, which I don't.
| hulitu wrote:
| Famous last words. /s
| lupusreal wrote:
| They use spies, we use spies. Simultaneously, both sides
| try to stop the other.
|
| Calling this "double standards" or hypocrisy isn't
| technically wrong but it's also very tedious. _Of course_
| countries have a different policy towards their own spies
| and foreign spies. Why should anybody ever expect
| otherwise?
| SequoiaHope wrote:
| I mean it in the "technically correct" usage, in reply to
| someone who seemed to expect a unified standard between
| China and the US. My point is to be clear that the US is
| also spying on US citizens, but the government and media
| only dislike it when other countries do it.
|
| Personally I don't like that the US government runs mass
| surveillance against US citizens.
|
| Also mass surveillance and spies are related but have
| some differences. The US can run mass surveillance
| through US corporations without spies, though I'm sure
| they also have spies.
| lukeschlather wrote:
| It's not a double standard. Meta is getting fines too,
| for similar offenses. Google actually seems to be
| compliant with the law.
| bobmcnamara wrote:
| Google was started on CIA MDDS grants.
| hnuser123456 wrote:
| One of the big pieces of Snowden's leaks is how the NSA
| has a backdoor into all of Google. Of course they're
| "compliant with the law". The law is to give the
| government a backdoor. This stuff is decided in the
| Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court and the cases and
| rulings are classified.
| SequoiaHope wrote:
| Indeed! Eric Schmidt was regularly meeting with pentagon
| officials. I think he had stepped down as CEO by the time
| of those reports, but he was obviously very friendly to
| US government interests. We really tend to assume that
| CEOs all want to protect their data from the government
| but if they don't want to do that we really can't know or
| defend against it while using those services.
| ipaddr wrote:
| In this case they are sending data to China. That's the
| evidence you were asking for. The average app isn't
| sending data to China. Thr faangs are collecting data and
| making money your government is using this data in police
| investigations but China is using it to undermine your
| government and way of life.
|
| Pretty bad.
| platinumrad wrote:
| The average app also isn't made by a company that is
| headquartered in China.
| vkou wrote:
| So the thing about fines for non-compliance is that they
| only have one direction to go if you don't comply.
| PurpleRamen wrote:
| > 'massive' -- by which standards?
|
| Other fines? Going by amount, it seems somewhere in the top 20
| of highest single case fines of all time. Top 3 if we just look
| at privacy fines in Europe.
|
| > It is high time we got used to companies being fined a
| reasonable fraction of their revenue
|
| How does "getting used to it" changes the classification? It's
| still a massive amount, even it such numbers are becoming more
| common. And especially as they should not become common.
| Rygian wrote:
| The point being that the actual absolute amount should not
| get as much attention as the percentage of revenue it
| represents.
| PeterStuer wrote:
| If I have 100MEUR in revenue with a 60% margin, a 6%
| revenue fine while not negliable can be brushed off as the
| price of doing business. If I have 100MEUR revenue with a
| 2% margin, a 6% fine might mean bankruptcy.
| eastbound wrote:
| If you have 18% margin (a more reasonable assumption in
| most IT), then it brings it down by 30%. Investors will
| care very much.
|
| Except state actors.
| dmix wrote:
| How is $600M not massive?
| rsynnott wrote:
| Arguably it's still at a level where it could be considered a
| cost of doing business. One school of thought is that for
| corporate punishment to be an effective deterrent it has to
| be _existential_; if you tell a company "if you do an illegal
| thing that makes you an extra billion dollars a year, we
| might eventually get around to fining you a few hundred
| million", then the rational company will say "sure, send us
| the bill whenever", and get on with doing the illegal thing.
| ziddoap wrote:
| When viewed as a percent of their annual revenue, rather than
| an absolute number, it's not really all that massive. It's
| like 3% or so.
|
| And you can't really just look at the 3%, you have to factor
| in what benefits (money, political sway, whatever) they
| received in exchange for the data. For simplicity, if they
| got paid, I don't know, $150M/yr from China for the data and
| they've been sending data for (at least) 4 years... They
| would have made a profit despite the fine!
|
| ($150M is obviously pulled out of my ass, just as a
| demonstration of how when you look at the fines from a bigger
| context, it might just be a line item on the expense report
| that's worth taking the risk on)
| dmix wrote:
| > When viewed as a percent of their annual revenue,
|
| I've always found this viewpoint a bit childish, with
| little regard for how businesses work IRL (even the
| ignoring the obvious profits vs revenue part). Reminds me
| of how every comment section re: some crime story is people
| calling for death penalty or how a mob should kill them
| first. Justice is never that simple.
|
| I understand people want businesses they don't like to
| simply not exist anymore but that doesn't mean it's
| rational to throw up insane fines because you spent 2min
| doing back of a napkin math of revenue * (imaginary
| deterrent %)
|
| > For simplicity, if they got paid, I don't know, $150M/yr
| from China for the data and they've been sending data for
| (at least) 4 years... They would have made a profit despite
| the fine!
|
| The Chinese government doesn't need to pay companies to
| exfiltrate data from companies within their reach.
| ziddoap wrote:
| > _I 've always found this viewpoint a bit childish,_
|
| It's childish to view fines as a percent of revenue
| rather than an absolute number...? That's certainly an
| odd take.
|
| Fines are meant to be a deterrent. If you fine Microsoft
| $50,000 they will literally not notice. If you fine my
| locally owned convenience store $50,000 they will
| probably be forced to close. It's absurd to ignore that.
|
| > _I understand people want businesses they don 't like
| to simply not exist anymore_
|
| I did not say this, or anything close to it.
|
| My entire point was that looking at a number in a vacuum
| and saying "that's massive" or "that's not that big" is
| silly. What's "massive" to some companies is a tiny blip
| on the radar of other companies.
|
| I cannot understand anyone who thinks looking at fines
| _in context_ is "childish".
|
| _Not_ looking at fines in context is something only the
| largest and richest of companies would be a proponent
| for, because it would make the fines absolutely
| meaningless for them while being effective against anyone
| smaller.
| bryan_w wrote:
| I'm convinced that when someone makes an argument using
| revenue vs profit, it is either a literal teenager (look
| at that huge number! I've never seen a number so big), or
| an inauthentic poster (just putting the fries in the bag)
| ta1243 wrote:
| To someone on the median global salary of $300 a month, $1000
| is a lot of money.
|
| To someone on $500k a year, $1k is a night out in vegas.
|
| To a billionaire, $1k is toilet paper.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| You think TikTok cares about money? They're a propaganda arm.
| They don't give a shit about profitability.
| Mistletoe wrote:
| Will they really pay it though? I don't know the rules, etc.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| They'll probably fight it and pay it if they risk being
| kicked out of Ireland or the EU.
| TechDebtDevin wrote:
| Weird that a "communist propaganda arm" would donate millions
| upon millions to RIGHT WING American Politicians/Parties who
| oppose almost all leftist beliefs, and have a board made up
| partly of Western Capitalists.
|
| [0]: https://www.barrons.com/articles/trump-campaign-
| donations-ti...
|
| [1]: https://www.msnbc.com/the-reidout/reidout-blog/tiktok-
| ceo-tr...
|
| [2]: https://mezha.media/en/2025/01/17/tiktok-to-be-the-main-
| spon...
|
| Seems pretty dumb if you're a Chinese Propaganda wings to
| fund foreign political opponents who literally want your
| society to fail. But I guess if Western Intelligence sources
| tell you they are a propaganda wing IT MUST BE TRUE!
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| People say that Israel propped up Hamas in the past so not
| really that weird on a conceptual level.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| What's weird that an expansionist superpower would donate
| to the isolationists of another superpower?
| lcnPylGDnU4H9OF wrote:
| That's... not weird at all, actually. If they think the
| right wing politicians having power would be beneficial to
| them in some way, why would they not donate to them in the
| hypothetical context that they are a propaganda arm for an
| adversarial government to those right wing politicians'
| government?
|
| It's worth nothing that the parent comment didn't call them
| a "communist" propaganda arm and you seem to have added
| that so you could say it wouldn't make sense for
| "communists" to donate to RIGHT WING politicians, which is
| a rather weak argument that ignores decades of geopolitics.
| TechDebtDevin wrote:
| Maybe people should stop and wonder if TT just built a
| stellar product that is very good at showing people what
| they want to see, not tricking people lmao... These same
| people who make these claims about TT are simply
| projecting. They should reckon with the possibility that
| just because a recommendation algorithm doesn't match
| your (very unpopular) bias, does not mean that it's a
| "Propaganda Engine/arm", and then maybe should ask
| themselves who really is the one wanting to do
| propaganda.
|
| TikTok shops, advertising, culture all are very
| capitalistic and I don't get any of these claims, nor has
| there ever been any proof outside of trust me bro from
| western establishment types. Their business model is very
| capitalistic, and they are very good at that game. They
| simply want to serve the most popular content to as many
| people as possible, sorry to those who's favorite content
| is off-putting and rude to most people
| (racists/misogynist/transphobic content). Just because
| TikTok does not want to serve that content, (and trust
| they still do), this does not make them a propaganda
| machine. It makes them not idiots at running a social
| media business... How much revenue does Parler, X, Truth
| Social have these days? TT makes 4-6x all those SM
| companies combined.
| tlb wrote:
| Worse than the small amount is the length of time it took. If
| you accept the accusations at face value, China has been spying
| on a large fraction of EU citizens for 4 years and can keep
| doing it for another 6 months (after which they probably won't
| actually stop) for the eventual fine of a few dollars per
| victim. The US isn't moving any faster, and most other
| countries aren't moving at all.
|
| So the end result is that potentially hostile countries can run
| vast spying operations for a long time with no major
| consequences. As long as they do it with funny videos with
| annoying soundtracks.
| hbarka wrote:
| Does Meta or X get the same scrutiny or is this the China
| bogeyman?
| input_sh wrote:
| X is rumored to be hit with a billion dollar fine
| soon(ish), so yes:
| https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/03/technology/eu-
| penalties-x...
| Macha wrote:
| Yes: https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/23/tech/european-
| union-apple...
|
| Meta has had multiple rounds of EURxxxM fines already from
| the EU.
| platinumrad wrote:
| The EU is fairly consistent in its application of fines.
| I think what the poster is commenting on is that when
| Meta collects data it's "Meta is spying", but when
| ByteDance collects data it's "China is spying".
| ipaddr wrote:
| An American company following the laws does not get the
| scrutiny that another company working with a hostile
| government to eliminate your way of life does. Why would
| they? Are they somehow equal because they both can be
| downloaded in the social app category in the play store?
|
| That's like asking why can I buy things from facebook
| marketplace but can't use my American credit card on
| vk.com?
| platinumrad wrote:
| I honestly don't think the Chinese government cares about
| my way of life.
| crazygringo wrote:
| Just a nitpick -- a fraction of their _profit_ (net income),
| not revenue. Most of revenue already goes out the door as
| expenses. If you fined as a reasonable fraction of revenue, you
| 'd simply bankrupt a corporation, which is not what you want if
| your goal is to change behavior.
|
| If global revenue is $20B and we assume 20% profitability,
| that's $4B, and so this fine is 15% of global profit.
|
| That's a _gigantic_ fine.
|
| You also have to remember that tons of these regulations are
| vague and unclear and massively open to interpretation, and
| that companies can genuinely believe they are complying, and
| their lawyers agree, but then judges still rule otherwise,
| because it's ultimately just a matter of opinion because of the
| vagueness.
|
| You also have to remember that _individual countries_ fining on
| _global_ revenue runs the risk of fines "duplicating" each
| other for the same or similar behavior, again bankrupting a
| corporation when the goal should be to change behavior.
| lmkg wrote:
| > You also have to remember that individual countries fining
| on global revenue runs the risk of fines "duplicating" each
| other for the same or similar behavior, again bankrupting a
| corporation when the goal should be to change behavior.
|
| This is explicitly not a concern under GDPR. The "one-stop
| shop" mechanism means that all issues across the EU get
| funneled to the lead supervisory authority, which is always
| Ireland because that's where EU subsidiaries are headquarters
| for tax purposes.
| gundmc wrote:
| Yes, but there are countries outside of the EU who may also
| decide to fine based on global revenue.
| ta1243 wrote:
| Either obey the law in those countries, or don't do
| business there.
| Macha wrote:
| > Just a nitpick -- a fraction of their profit (net income),
| not revenue. Most of revenue already goes out the door as
| expenses. If you fined as a reasonable fraction of revenue,
| you'd simply bankrupt a corporation, which is not what you
| want if your goal is to change behavior.
|
| Nah, hollywood accounting is alive and well in tech.
| Especially in Ireland, where plenty of tech companies are
| being "charged" slightly absurd fees for services or
| trademark licenses by subsidiaries or parents in other
| countries to avoid making a profit on their tax filings.
| crazygringo wrote:
| No -- there's no such thing as Hollywood accounting in tech
| at the global level.
|
| Yes you can certainly shift things around at the _country_
| level. But when you add up all the subsidiaries together in
| the single _global_ corporation (the publicly traded one
| when it exists), the numbers are the numbers. Income minus
| expenses is a single, stable number that you can 't fudge.
| lupusreal wrote:
| Doing anything by fractions of profit is an invitation for
| Hollywood accounting. _" Oops we have no profit because we
| have accountants who's job it is to shuffle money around in
| circles until everybody gets confused and gives up."_
|
| > _simply bankrupt a corporation, which is not what you want
| if your goal is to change behavior._
|
| Yes it is. Nuke the corporation and burn all the investors.
| This will teach a lesson.
| crazygringo wrote:
| No it's not.
|
| The goal of punishment is correction of behavior, not
| destruction.
|
| By your logic, we ought to apply the death penalty for
| stealing a candy bar. Because that will teach a lesson too,
| no?
| lupusreal wrote:
| The purposes of punishment include rehabilitation, as you
| mention, but also deterrence, incapacitation,
| retribution, denunciation, and restoration:
|
| Deterrence: Destruction of the corporation serves as a
| lesson to the rest of society, to scare them away from
| doing the same.
|
| Incapacitation: A corporation which no longer exists
| cannot reoffend.
|
| Retribution: The deserve nothing less.
|
| Denunciation: Overlaps with deterrence; gives people the
| benifit of knowing they live in a society where
| wrongdoing is punished. Suppresses vigilantism.
|
| Restoration: The funds retrieved by bankrupting and
| liquidating the corporation can, at least in principle,
| go towards undoing the harm the corporation caused.
|
| As for stealing candy bars, I think there is merit to
| going light on children. But corporations? Corporations
| are not children. They aren't even people. They deserve
| no mercy.
| observationist wrote:
| This is wrong, and even revenue isn't sufficient - you want
| to fine a sizeable fraction of the total value of all assets
| of the company based on the scope, duration, and severity of
| the violation.
|
| Companies don't protect user data. They store, silo, and
| secure user data for as little cost as possible. No
| meaningful consequences means they will continue to harvest
| and disperse user data at an increasing rate until we get
| serious about requiring responsible practices and
| accountability.
|
| The risk of being bankrupted is what will keep a corporation
| behaving well.
|
| Penalties should be fatal to a corporation. If Microsoft or
| some random new startup had to follow the same regulations
| and protect user data to some bare minimum standard, and we
| apply the same degree of penalty, rather than some
| arbitrarily large fine which the mega corps are happy to pay,
| we can affect behavior.
|
| The big companies have teams of lawyers who effectively (and
| sometimes explicitly) collude with the beancounters and MBAs
| to enshittify their products and services and milk every last
| drop of revenue, even exploiting the data of non-customers
| who just happened to encounter some peripheral surveillance
| apparatus.
|
| We need to protect individual data privacy and restrict
| anything except informed consensual tracking. We need to
| mandate ephemerality and basic security standards. We need to
| make violations of these regulations lethal to a company, and
| impose mandatory minimum jail time for c-suite offenders.
|
| Anything short of this results in overt, blatant, repeated
| violations of the laws by the big companies because they're
| happy to pay $5m or even $50m if it means they extract $500m
| more revenue _and_ lock out any potential disruptive
| competition.
|
| This would effectively mean that giant platforms which cannot
| responsibly store and manage user data would not be able to
| continue operation at the scale they're at. It would mean
| fragmentation and decentralization of various services,
| disincentivizing monopoly, improving market health, driving
| product and service progress.
|
| Without harsh and extreme consequences that are as
| meaningfully painful to FAANG sized megacorps as they are to
| a one man startup, the problems won't ever be resolved. FAANG
| and tech outpaced regulation, resulting in effectively the
| total pwnage of data for more or less every living human on
| the planet. This is unacceptable, and the only way it changes
| is for the US to drop the hammer on the exploitive and
| irresponsible practices that led us here.
|
| Let these asshats go bankrupt. We don't need Meta or Alphabet
| or Amazon. They're not entitled to screw the world for
| profit. If they can't operate ethically and responsibly, then
| they shouldn't be allowed to operate at all.
| linkregister wrote:
| This is an incomplete understanding of the stakeholders in
| these rulings.
|
| 1. The goal of the fines is to act as a deterrent and to
| encourage companies to get back into compliance.
|
| 2. The arbiters aren't operating in a vacuum. Bankrupting
| services that the citizens of a country rely on is
| unpopular and not in service of goal #1.
|
| 3. We know that this is the case because Uber and other
| ride sharing services were able to violate the law and
| convince voters to have the law changed to permit these
| services.
|
| 4. Fines impacting net revenue are dealt with seriously by
| companies when they are adequately large, e.g. 10% of net
| revenue. Compliance departments are not funded as a job
| creation or charity exercise. When companies report
| earnings, these fines frequently determine whether earnings
| guidance is achieved. This impacts company officers'
| compensation.
|
| tl;dr, you passionately believe in these views, but it is
| not one held by the majority. Your minority view should not
| be the basis of public policy.
| ta1243 wrote:
| So a company should be free to break as many laws as it
| wants and never have any risk to its owners?
| linkregister wrote:
| > Fines impacting net revenue are dealt with seriously by
| companies when they are adequately large, e.g. 10% of net
| revenue.
|
| That's financial risk.
|
| For criminal risk, a change to existing laws would have
| to be made; they currently carry only civil penalties to
| the organizations involved. I think that those laws would
| be popular. They would have to be carefully crafted to
| narrowly target behavior without unacceptably impairing
| capital investment and business formation. That would
| negatively impact the quality of life of the countries'
| residents.
| hulitu wrote:
| _cough_ Airbnb, Uber _cough_. /s
| ta1243 wrote:
| > Let these asshats go bankrupt.
|
| No need to go bankrupt, just force-issue more shares,
| diluting the existing shareholders. These are then sold on
| the open market and the revenue goes to paying the fine.
|
| Only if the share price drops to zero does the company then
| go bankrupt.
| ta1243 wrote:
| When you get a fine in Europe it tends to be related to your
| income. Not your income after your expenses, your actual
| income.
|
| Finland for example will fine you 100k for speeding if your
| income is high enough. In the UK fines range from 50% of your
| weekly income (band A) to 600% of your weekly income. Someone
| on PS500 a week income and spending that on housing, food
| etc, could pay PS3k. Someone with the same offence on PS50k a
| week would be fined PS300k.
| ipaddr wrote:
| Someone unemployed speeding to a job interview gets a pass?
| That seems like a big loop hole.
| crazygringo wrote:
| Well, individuals and corporations are different.
|
| Individuals are also _taxed_ on all their income, whereas
| corporations are _taxed_ only on their profit.
|
| Corporations are effectively intermediaries in production
| chains. Profit is the only meaningful metric, how much
| value do they add. Individuals are at the "end" of the
| chain, how much value do they consume.
|
| The proper analogy of a fine being based on income for an
| individual, is for a fine being based on profit for a
| corporation.
| gaiagraphia wrote:
| The internal operations of a company shoud be irrelevant to
| nations.
|
| If a company is taking PSbillion out of a nation's spending
| power, and doing so with nefarious practices, that's what
| should be fined.
|
| If bankruptcy is a worry, then comapnies shouldn't fly so
| close to the sun when adopting immoral practices.
|
| Income is the only reliable thing you can tax. Trying to
| calculate profit for international companies is an absolute
| joke which is massively inefficient. Why an Earth should
| governments employ entire teams to second guess internal
| bookkeeping?
|
| If you want to take a billion from a nation's citizens,
| better be sure you're providing a legal service. I mean, are
| drug dealers punished on profit?
| crazygringo wrote:
| Nothing of what you're saying makes any sense.
|
| > _Income is the only reliable thing you can tax._
|
| Then why does every country on earth tax corporate _profit_
| , not income?
|
| > _Why an Earth should governments employ entire teams to
| second guess internal bookkeeping?_
|
| Because that's how you make sure companies pay their taxes?
| Because it's a net gain to employ those teams because they
| find much more tax cheating than it costs to employ them?
|
| > _If a company is taking PSbillion out of a nation 's
| spending power_
|
| Companies don't. They take cash and in return provide
| services that are _even more valuable_. The entire idea of
| free trade is that it 's positive-sum for all.
| GeoAtreides wrote:
| >You also have to remember that tons of these regulations are
| vague and unclear and massively open to interpretation, and
| that companies can genuinely believe they are complying, and
| their lawyers agree, but then judges still rule otherwise,
| because it's ultimately just a matter of opinion because of
| the vagueness.
|
| This is the equivalent of the famous Babbage anecdote, but
| for the law. That's absolutely not how the law or regulatory
| compliance works, not in Europe at least.
| crazygringo wrote:
| ...but it absolutely is? Why do you think fines get
| appealed, and companies often win on appeal?
|
| If there weren't vagueness and shades of gray, then appeals
| courts would barely need to exist.
| _DeadFred_ wrote:
| Someone here floated that instead of fines it should be
| government ownership in the company. You dilute the original
| owners, so they get punished for bad behavior. As a part owner,
| the government is now 'inside' and has a whole lot more
| visibility/ability to request information. And over time,
| should bad behavior continue, the government gains control.
|
| Look at a company like Tesla whose stock is super high but
| profits low. A percentage of profits wouldn't mater to them.
| But government control via stock would get their attention and
| the attention of stock owners real quick.
| hulitu wrote:
| > 'massive' -- by which standards?
|
| By "EC" [1] standards. If you not pay for the product "EC", you
| are the product. Microsoft, Google, Apple, Amazon pay good
| money to "EC".
|
| [1] European commision.
| codetrotter wrote:
| Ie in the title of the HN submission is not the Euro symbol.
|
| EUR is.
| Alifatisk wrote:
| The title have been changed and they added the symbol, I can't
| update the title anymore. Hopefully Dang fixes it.
| faraggi wrote:
| Also, the EUR symbol is a suffix to amounts, not a prefix like
| $.
| switch007 wrote:
| Not universally
|
| > Placement of the sign varies. Countries have generally
| continued the style used for their former currencies. In
| those countries where previous convention was to place the
| currency sign before the figure, the euro sign is placed in
| the same position (e.g., EUR3.50).[7] In those countries
| where the amount preceded the national currency sign, the
| euro sign is again placed in that relative position (e.g.,
| 3,50 EUR).
|
| > In English, the euro sign - like the dollar sign <$> and
| the pound sign <PS> - is usually placed before the figure,
| unspaced,[8] the reverse of usage in many other European
| languages
|
| > The European Union's Interinstitutional Style Guide (for EU
| staff) states that the euro sign should be placed in front of
| the amount without any space in English, but after the amount
| in most other languages
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_sign#Use
| Cribbin wrote:
| That actually varies by country. In Ireland it is used as a
| prefix
| secondcoming wrote:
| Only in some countries. The position of the currency symbol
| is a locale thing
| Marsymars wrote:
| It very much is a locale thing, not even a country thing -
| e.g. en-ca and fr-ca have '$' as a prefix/suffix,
| respectively.
| jtvjan wrote:
| I think that convention depends on the language, not the
| currency.
|
| For example, in German it's usually written postfix, but in
| Dutch it's usually prefix.
| trollbridge wrote:
| I just trust whatever the LC_CURRENCY settings do.
| myfonj wrote:
| (TIL) Ie U+0404 Cyrillic Capital Letter
| Ukrainian Ie
|
| https://codepoints.net/U+0404
| miroljub wrote:
| Now, I'm still waiting for those watchdogs to fine Facebook,
| Google, Apple, Microsoft, and bazillion other companies over data
| transfer to the USA.
|
| Just kidding, I know it won't happen.
|
| But at least paying some taxes in Ireland should be possible,
| shouldn't it?
| conradfr wrote:
| Facebook has been, Uber as well.
| subscribed wrote:
| There are multiple ways EU-based user data can be lawfully
| transferred to the US, due to the similarities in the bits of
| the data protection law.
|
| I'm not aware of the similar arrangements being possible with
| China-based providers.
| gkbrk wrote:
| Instead of claiming things without doing 1 minute of research,
| you could have just checked a GDPR enforcement tracker [1].
|
| If you sort by largest fines, you'll see that Meta, Amazon,
| TikTok, LinkedIn (Microsoft), Uber, WhatsApp (Meta) and Google
| have all been fined.
|
| [1]: https://www.enforcementtracker.com/
| diggan wrote:
| > Now, I'm still waiting for those watchdogs to fine Facebook,
| Google, Apple, Microsoft, and bazillion other companies over
| data transfer to the USA.
|
| Why wait when it already happened? Not only are you overly
| pessimistic, but incorrect as well.
|
| - https://www.euronews.com/next/2023/05/22/us-tech-giant-
| meta-...
|
| - https://techcrunch.com/2023/07/03/google-analytics-sweden-
| gd...
|
| - (not a fine, but told to stop transferring)
| https://www.pymnts.com/cpi-posts/eu-watchdog-orders-european...
|
| Then we have this wonderful website:
| https://www.enforcementtracker.com/ (which currently has 2583
| entries)
| disgruntledphd2 wrote:
| Your information on tax is very out of date. All the big tech
| companies pay loads of tax in Ireland now.
|
| And additionally FB were fined 500mn last week by the same
| regulator.
| SilverBirch wrote:
| Two things I wonder about: first are these fines actually going
| to happen or is the sort of thing where it gets appealed
| indefinitely. And second, where do the fines go? It sounds a lot
| like since Ireland is where Tiktok is getting fined the fines go
| to the Irish government which would seem crazy. The fines are
| assessed in the context of the full EU, but only Ireland gets the
| revenue? This is broken.
| aurareturn wrote:
| If it's truly Ireland only, then Tiktok might just exit the
| country and not pay the fine. Perhaps this is what Ireland
| wants?
|
| Ireland is a small market. It'll take forever to make 530m in
| profit in Ireland for Tiktok.
| tossandthrow wrote:
| TikTok has their EU office in Ireland, that is why the case
| is happening there.
|
| The verdict is for the entire EU, they'd have to exit the EU
| market.
| pjc50 wrote:
| TikTok EU is based out of Ireland, so they'd have to move the
| whole datacentre. https://newsroom.tiktok.com/en-gb/tiktok-
| european-data-centr...
|
| Meanwhile this is a very interesting read on their corporate
| structure: https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/1
| 3247/defau...
|
| "On corporate structure specifically, there is a
| misconception that TikTok UK is a subsidiary of ByteDance's
| operations in China. This is not the case. TikTok UK is owned
| by global parent company ByteDance Ltd, incorporated in the
| Cayman Islands"
|
| .. now, everyone talks about China as a global enemy of
| freedom and accountability, but I think Grand Cayman is
| underestimated as a bad actor or protector thereof.
| rsynnott wrote:
| It would have to leave Europe. This is being done under the
| auspices of the EU GDPR.
| diggan wrote:
| > And second, where do the fines go?
|
| Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but the income from the money
| eventually flows into the overall EU budget, so it's like we
| (EU residents) get a tiny rebate on our taxes. But seems to
| also depend on each country, Spain is somewhat unique in that
| the DPA seems to keep it themselves.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| >> so it's like we (EU residents) get a tiny rebate on our
| taxes.
|
| Don't know specifically about this scenario, but I've never
| seen a government's general revenues account treated like
| this. Governments rarely pay "dividends" - unless you're a
| targeted voting block they decide to go after.
| rsynnott wrote:
| The EU, specifically, essentially runs a balanced budget,
| so increased revenue from stuff other than member state
| contributions will reduce the required member state
| contributions. Of course how each member state funds those
| and what it does with them if they get cheaper is up to
| that member state.
| tpm wrote:
| You are partly wrong, the money from fines eventually flows
| into the overall EU budget, which is financed by
| contributions from member countries, so this contribution
| will be a bit lower, but this will not propagate into lower
| taxes for us.
| diggan wrote:
| > this will not propagate into lower taxes for us.
|
| Yeah, sorry if I was unclear, I didn't mean that residents
| would literally have a line item on their tax bill because
| of the fines. But since the fines go into the overall
| budget, it's like the budget grows (in a very small amount)
| without people having higher taxes.
| pjc50 wrote:
| UK: the regulator which issues the fine pays almost all of it
| (minus some expense recovery) into the consolidated fund, i.e.
| the same pot as taxes.
|
| This is roughly what I'd expect. The EU does very little law
| enforcement _directly_ , most is done through national
| regulators.
|
| This is the reverse of the Apple situation, where the EU fined
| the Irish government for not collecting enough taxes from
| Apple.
| tailspin2019 wrote:
| For clarity, I don't think the UK is involved in this at all.
|
| This seems to be a fine issued in the Republic of Ireland
| which is not part of the UK (but, unlike the UK, _is_ still
| part of the EU).
| s_dev wrote:
| https://www.enforcementtracker.com/
| switch007 wrote:
| Does that confirm that a fine payment was made?
| johnisgood wrote:
| I do not think it says.
| DarkmSparks wrote:
| Far better than the ban them idea tbh.
|
| Although I suspect US regulators won't like this approach because
| they want to syphon EU users data up as much as China.
| cynicalsecurity wrote:
| Not enough. A fine is just a price for people's private data.
| Companies should never be allowed to transfer private data of
| citizens to authoritarian countries and should be de-registered
| and banned from accessing the free world in such case.
| Eavolution wrote:
| I agree but over half a billion euros is quite the price, if
| the price is high enough it won't be viable to break the laws.
| goodpoint wrote:
| The good old slap on the wrist
| GrumpyNl wrote:
| As long as we dont fine the people in charge, these fines are
| useless and have no impact.
| thinkingtoilet wrote:
| On top of that, if the fine is less than the money that is
| made, it's not a fine, it's a cost of business.
| s_dev wrote:
| There's a lot of frustration and cynicism in this thread, but I
| suspect some misunderstandings might be fuelling it. First off,
| Ireland is part of the EU, and under GDPR's 'one-stop-shop'
| system, the country where a company has its EU headquarters in
| Ireland, in the case of many tech giants it takes the lead on
| enforcement for the entire EU. So when Ireland's regulator fines
| a company under GDPR, they're essentially doing it on behalf of
| the whole EU, it's not just Ireland acting alone.
|
| GDPR fines can be very significant, the rules allow penalties
| either as a percentage of a company's global revenue or as a
| large fixed amount whichever is higher. This ensures even the
| biggest companies feel the impact. Plus, these fines are public
| and transparent. Every big fine is announced and reported, which
| means there's a reputational hit alongside the financial one.
| That publicity is intentional: it adds pressure on companies to
| improve, making the fines a real deterrent rather than just a
| quiet cost of doing business.
|
| It's also worth clarifying where the fine money goes. It doesn't
| just line Ireland's pockets. In practice, the money goes into the
| EU budget. If Ireland collects a hefty fine, that amount is
| basically offset against what Ireland would normally contribute
| to the EU budget. If people in other EU countries were affected
| by the violation, those countries can request a portion of the
| fine as well. In short, Ireland isn't profiting solo from these
| fines, it's just the point of collection because that's where the
| companies are based.
|
| Interestingly, some comments here call the fines 'insane' (too
| harsh) while others say they're 'a slap on the wrist' (too
| lenient). That contradiction highlights the misconceptions around
| GDPR fines. In reality, these penalties are meant to be serious
| enough to matter, but proportionate to a company's size and the
| offence. They're not intended to destroy a business, but they're
| definitely not nothing either, they serve as a real consequence
| to encourage companies to respect people's privacy.
| tossandthrow wrote:
| > ... percentage of a company's global revenue or as a large
| fixed amount whichever is higher.
|
| It should be noted that this is used to establish a maximum
| fine.
|
| Then the regulator can fine at X% of the maximum fine.
|
| It should be noted, that this is established to avoid that
| individual EU member states fine too little to attract business
| (Like Ireland has previously had issues on re. too little
| taxing)
| pjc50 wrote:
| It would really help to have some references on the details of
| the fine routing, because this comes up a lot. Dozens of posts
| here, and it always gets argued over when GDPR is mentioned.
| NoahZuniga wrote:
| > If Ireland collects a hefty fine, that amount is basically
| offset against what Ireland would normally contribute to the EU
| budget
|
| Ireland paying x less dues is practically equivalent to them
| earning x money; it does just line Ireland's pockets. (Of
| course this is just the portion that isn't requested by other
| EU countries)
| ThePowerOfFuet wrote:
| @dang Can you please put this in the title? EUR
|
| Thank you for saving our eyes.
| dang wrote:
| Let's get that Ie out of there!
| nickdothutton wrote:
| Reminder: Meta was fined 1.2 billion euro by the Irish data
| protection authority. May 22, 2023 was the enforcement date.
|
| Question: How many euro do you think have been paid as of today,
| 2nd May 2025?
| Aperocky wrote:
| Don't leave us hanging, none of us know.
| Alifatisk wrote:
| I agree, the parent comment should've just said it. Had to
| look it up, seems like they've paid none so far
| rpozarickij wrote:
| I had to look this one up as well as the sibling comment, but
| the question reminded me of the Betteridge's law of headlines
| [0] and it looks like this law is indeed applicable here
| (meaning that nothing has been paid yet).
|
| [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headl
| ine...
| nickdothutton wrote:
| Sorry, I thought HN would naturally assume the right answer
| immediately. I could have commented "clue: it's a round
| number". They haven't paid any of it. Probably never will,
| perhaps in exchange for some job creation. Never take these
| kinds of announcement of fines at face value when you read
| them.
| peterpost2 wrote:
| Do you have a source for this? I'm having a hard time
| finding that they did not pay.
| nickdothutton wrote:
| It is in the appeals process. No pronouncement yet that
| it will actually be enforced that I can find. (Sorry for
| LN Paywall, but you get the gist of it).
|
| [1] https://www.lexisnexis.co.uk/legal/news/meta-s-irish-
| appeal-...
| rsynnott wrote:
| Well, I mean, yeah, it's not a bill of attainder, and they
| get to appeal. For something like this, a company will
| _always_ appeal, even if they are sure they cannot win the
| appeal, because then they get to hold onto a billion
| dollars for an extra year or so, and the value of that is
| far greater than any legal fees they're likely to incur.
|
| > Probably never will, perhaps in exchange for some job
| creation
|
| That bit I'd be more dubious on. Ireland's courts are very
| independent (sometimes to the point of comedy, for instance
| see the incident a decade ago where the courts found that
| the legal mechanism used to ban most drugs was invalid:
| https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/10/irish-es-
| are-s... , leading to ecstasy, ketamine etc becoming legal
| for a day). It's not a US-style highly-politicised court
| system, and even if the government wanted to influence the
| eventual outcome, it doesn't really have levers to do so.
|
| They're cranking through the process, but, like, unless the
| GDPR is found to be _unconstitutional_ (seems implausible,
| given the enormous amount of constitutional scrutiny that
| EU law has already had), they're probably looking at paying
| once the process comes to an end.
| peterpost2 wrote:
| Do you have a source for this? I'm having a hard time finding
| that they did not pay.
| dhruvrrp wrote:
| I went digging for this, and their SEC filing for 2024
| mention they have a stay from the Irish High Court.
|
| > The IDPC issued an administrative fine of EUR EUR1.2
| billion as well as corrective orders requiring Meta Platforms
| Ireland to suspend the relevant transfers and to bring its
| processing operations into compliance with Chapter V GDPR by
| ceasing the unlawful processing, including storage, of such
| data in the United States. We are appealing this Final
| Decision and it is currently subject to an interim stay from
| the Irish High Court.
|
| https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1326801/000132680125.
| ..
| switch007 wrote:
| Exactly. A lot of the EU is just performative blustering,
| making the populations think they're the lord their saviour.
| Incredible PR and marketing.
|
| That fine got an incredible amount of media attention.
|
| The lack of actually paying it, not so much...
| WorldPeas wrote:
| I'm sure they're just acting within the law here, but I'm pretty
| sure the bigger threat isn't the egress of data but rather the
| ingress of influence over the app's algorithm, and therefore
| users
| rbanffy wrote:
| Roughly EUR100 per Irish resident. Not bad.
| barbazoo wrote:
| More like what, EUR1.50 per EU citizen.
| rbanffy wrote:
| Other entities in the EU can also hit Bytedance.
| Macha wrote:
| Not for GDPR.
|
| If they've broken other laws, then maybe.
| breppp wrote:
| In the future, Europe's entire GDP will be made of privacy fines
| Ylpertnodi wrote:
| You're welcome.
| elnatro wrote:
| Hope the use that money to improve things for the people there!
| hnpolicestate wrote:
| Does this Irish privacy watchdog investigate Tik Tok data
| transfers to the Irish government, U.S etc? If not, it's a case
| of powerful institutions fighting over who has spying rights to
| their serfs.
| tiffanyh wrote:
| Slightly OT: how does the money from fines get used by the
| government that issued the fine?
|
| e.g. does it go into funding data privacy related
| activities/work?
| edent wrote:
| Taxes are very rarely hypothecated. In most countries, if you
| pay the "bear tax" it doesn't go into a big pot solely used for
| the eradication of bears.
|
| So fines like this normally go into the general pot of
| government spending.
|
| In the UK, data breach fines are spent on running the
| enforcement organisation - with the remainder going back to the
| state. https://ico.org.uk/about-the-ico/who-we-are/how-we-are-
| funde...
| splatterxl wrote:
| UK is not involved in this case. It's the Irish Data
| Protection Commission --
| https://www.dataprotection.ie/en/who-we-are
| arlort wrote:
| In the EU it means next year member states have to pay a little
| bit less into the budget
|
| The EU budget itself doesn't really change so it's not "more
| money" in a practical sense
|
| (I realised I might've skipped a step but this fine is EU wide,
| not Ireland specific, the fine gets paid to the EU IIRC)
| daft_pink wrote:
| kind of undercuts their whole narrative
| lazyeye wrote:
| 100% of the money recovered from these fines should be spent on
| researching and publicising the privacy abuses of these
| companies. They should essentially be funding their own policing.
|
| Who knows how this data they are harvesting at scale will be
| exploited by AI in the future. It is pretty scary.
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