Remember that Cambridge Analytica was "research" as well. Laws like these sound good on paper, but it's the company that has to deal with the fallout when the data is used improperly. Unless the government can also come up with a fool proof framework for data sharing and enforce adequate protections, it's always going to be better for the companies to just say no and eat the fines.
Sorry but this sounds like a privacy nightmare. No one should trust random researchers with mountains of data. They clearly won’t know how to secure it. But also the angle of trying to police information and elections is disturbing, especially after several instances of the EU interfering in elections in recent times.
I'd hate to be the engineer that has to deal with these requests. Not even a formal government investigation, just any number of random 3rd party researchers demanding specialized access.
American corporations don't want to accede to european rules about access to data, but it would be grossly simplistic to say all the problem lies on either side. I am not an EU resident but I tend to think there are sound reasons for some of what they want, and as American corporate entities the majors are bound in some tricky issues around US state department expectations, FTC expectations, but it isn't just trade, it's also civil liberties and privacy-vs-security political autonomy issues.
I would have preferred the companies like this emerged as federated entities and european data stayed in european DC and was subject to european laws. I think it would have avoided a lot of this, if they had not constructed themselves to be a single US corporate sheild, with transfer pricing on the side to maximise profit.
Republicans and Elon Musk have become very skilled at exerting political influence in the US [1] and Europe [2] through social media in ways the public isn't really aware of. Is this really that far from the goal of Cambridge Analytica of influencing elections without people's knowledge? Is it fine for large online platforms to influence election outcomes? Why wouldn't an online platform be used to this end if that's beneficial for it and there is no regulation discouraging it?
I'm not really sure what the argument is for letting these researchers make users of these platforms non-consenting participants in their studies? Is it even possible to opt out?
Because of the EU’s strict regulations, many internet products have simply given up on the European market. In some ways, this makes Europe seem a bit “behind the times.” Of course, the world still needs some conservatives to keep things in balance.
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[ 1.8 ms ] story [ 60.1 ms ] threadI would have preferred the companies like this emerged as federated entities and european data stayed in european DC and was subject to european laws. I think it would have avoided a lot of this, if they had not constructed themselves to be a single US corporate sheild, with transfer pricing on the side to maximise profit.
[1] https://www.techpolicy.press/x-polls-skew-political-realitie...
[2] https://zenodo.org/records/14880275