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Comment by bryanrasmussen | Hacker News Reader

What is Facebook's end game here, I don't get it. GDPR is around the corner, it certainly won't fly under GDPR so why the jurisdiction argument even, the days for tracking people without consent is numbered - a rational organization would realize this.

I would think just say ok we stop doing it because we're going to have to stop doing it anyway. But they're not stopping, what is the plan?!?

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If Facebook's business model is built around collecting and selling personal data, and more than 4% of their revenue globally comes from EU citizens, then they could decide to wilfully flout GDPR and just pay the maximum fine every year.

Another way they could deal with it is by disputing the EU-US privacy shield[1] or disputing the decision that overturned the original privacy safe harbour[2]. IANAL so I have no idea how they would do this, but it will be costly for ECJ and FB.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EU-US_Privacy_Shield [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Safe_Harbor_Priv...

I don't think that 4% is limited per annum, so that if you've paid 4% for case 1 in that year you pay out 0% for case 2+ in that year.

on edit: looking here https://www.i-scoop.eu/gdpr/gdpr-fines-guidelines-applicatio... it seems the second level of fines go up to 2% and are on a per case basis.

I keep reading this statement that Facebook sells personal data. Where is it stated that Facebook does this? Where is this fact of information defined?

My impression is FB allows targeted advertising without selling anything. In fact, why would FB sell their most valuable asset?

If a court rules that something you're doing violates the law, then that also means that you actually have to stop doing it. Not stopping with it would be a felony.

So, you can't just continuously pay fines whenever a court rules another time that it's illegal. The fine for a felony is much higher and at some point, you'd also simply be thrown out, or blocked in the case of Facebook, I suppose.

A fine doesn't imply that you can continue processing the data. GDPR also requires them to stop handling all such data if they don't have a legal right to do so (since the default case, if they can't show a valid legal reason, is that they're not allowed to do it).

And that's a maximum fine for a particular decision not the maximum fine annually. They can certainly be fined once and ordered to stop processing the data within, say, 30 days; then fined once more after the 30 days have passed for noncompliance with that order, and then so on.

There also is personal liability for the responsible executives and employees who'd be violating the regulator's order.

What's even worse is that they are effectively shafting everyone using their pixel to track sales through Facebook. If my understanding of GDPR is correct, Facebook's clients are liable under GDPR because they are giving their customers' data away (Facebook is data processor in that case). Facebook maintains 100% radio silence over it, and even if they come up with something tomorrow, it's too late for many to become compliant in time.

Any delay is money, so Facebook doesn't have an incentive to comply early.It makes more sense for them to appeal until all legal options are exhausted, even if it is clear that they will lose the lawsuit.

a sale or merger of the company. maybe a company like MSFT or Google would buy it, along with all the data. just think of the integration opportunities!

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