YouTube's Fine Criticized As Proof US Government Is 'Not Serious' About Big Tech Crackdown (cnbc.com) 63
YouTube's $170 million fine for illegally collecting data on children "shows the US government is not serious about a Big Tech crackdown," argues an article at CNBC:
The FTC's new settlement with YouTube over alleged violations of child privacy rules is just a fraction of the revenue its parent company generates in a single day. Shares of Google parent company Alphabet were up following news of the settlement, just like shares of Facebook after its record FTC fine. The action shows the U.S. government is not prepared for a Big Tech crackdown that will fundamentally alter the business.
Momentum is building in Washington to crack down on Big Tech's most free-wheeling practices: the Department of Justice is conducting a broad review of tech companies in addition to a reported antitrust investigation of Google, and Facebook disclosed a new antitrust probe by the Federal Trade Commission in July. But the meager penalties imposed on these companies in recent years, when compared with their size, shows the U.S. government is not yet prepared to take actions that will fundamentally alter the industry...
Wednesday's announcement marks the third agreement the FTC has reached with Google since 2011, when it charged the company with using "deceptive" privacy practices at the launch of its now-defunct social network. In 2012, the agency hit Google with a $22.5 million penalty, its highest ever for a violation of a commission order at the time, over charges that it misrepresented its ad-targeting practices to consumers. But in 2019, Google appears none the worse for wear. Google's stock price has grown more than 260% since the time of its historic 2012 FTC penalty and the company's now worth more than $800 billion. Revenue and profits have both more than doubled.
The article also notes that "Despite the penalties and noise from politicians about cracking down, Facebook's stock is up more than 40% so far this year," arguing that "the agencies that have so far had the power to force Big Tech to make real changes have opted for more incremental adjustments."
A long-time Slashdot reader has another suggestion: Stop the madness of fines. Just sentence the leadership to jail and prison time... Don't fine the companies. That just hurts the stockholders who really don't know whats going on in the board room...
Momentum is building in Washington to crack down on Big Tech's most free-wheeling practices: the Department of Justice is conducting a broad review of tech companies in addition to a reported antitrust investigation of Google, and Facebook disclosed a new antitrust probe by the Federal Trade Commission in July. But the meager penalties imposed on these companies in recent years, when compared with their size, shows the U.S. government is not yet prepared to take actions that will fundamentally alter the industry...
Wednesday's announcement marks the third agreement the FTC has reached with Google since 2011, when it charged the company with using "deceptive" privacy practices at the launch of its now-defunct social network. In 2012, the agency hit Google with a $22.5 million penalty, its highest ever for a violation of a commission order at the time, over charges that it misrepresented its ad-targeting practices to consumers. But in 2019, Google appears none the worse for wear. Google's stock price has grown more than 260% since the time of its historic 2012 FTC penalty and the company's now worth more than $800 billion. Revenue and profits have both more than doubled.
The article also notes that "Despite the penalties and noise from politicians about cracking down, Facebook's stock is up more than 40% so far this year," arguing that "the agencies that have so far had the power to force Big Tech to make real changes have opted for more incremental adjustments."
A long-time Slashdot reader has another suggestion: Stop the madness of fines. Just sentence the leadership to jail and prison time... Don't fine the companies. That just hurts the stockholders who really don't know whats going on in the board room...
So? (Score:2, Insightful)
The only thing our government is currently fully engaged with is:
1. Trashing anything connected to Obama.
2. Racism. Just over-the-top racism.
3. Promoting conservative-supporting businesses. Especially Trump estates.
Everything else doesn't really have a priority - it can happen, but requires someone by chance being in place that cares about it - which is becoming increasingly rare.
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The only thing our government is currently fully engaged with is:
1. Trashing anything connected to Obama.
2. Racism. Just over-the-top racism.
3. Promoting conservative-supporting businesses. Especially Trump estates.
Everything else doesn't really have a priority - it can happen, but requires someone by chance being in place that cares about it - which is becoming increasingly rare.
4) Whining on endlessly about Hillary Clinton.
5) Modifying weather maps and other fact and observation based science to conform with Donald Trump's alternative relaity.
6) Figuring out how best to grovel before and suck up to the 2nd coming of god.
The current govnt? (Score:4, Interesting)
Is anything but 'serious'.
Seriously corrupt is the word you're seeking.
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Nobody cares. Everybody wants a piece, so corruption wins the vote.
Unlike Europe (Score:2)
Few US laws specify penalties in "percentage of income/profits/livestock" or "enough that it hurts". To do such would probably get those laws thrown out as unconstitutional.
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Regardless of the amount of the fine, the stock will go up when the exact figure is announced. That's the most basic thing about how markets work. Not that I expect "journalists" to know anything at all about anything they report. Similarly, when the market's awaiting the details of any good news, the stock will drop when the details are announced.
The drop in stock price, if any, happened when news leaked out that there might be a fine in the future. The fine was priced in long ago. Once the exact deta
Revenue is meaningless (Score:2)
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Total company revenue is also meaningless when trying to decide if the fine is reasonable. What were the actual damages, and how much did the company profit as a result of the specific activity which caused those damages? My gut agrees that this fine seems small, but nothing in the main article or summary provides me any useful information (there were a lot of linked articles in the summary and I admittedly haven't read all of them).
All I found from a quick Google search was this [reuters.com] article where the FTC's Beu
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If that multiplier was x2, I would agree this fine is far too low. If the multiple was x10, then it sounds more appropriate.
Why is 2x too low and 10x appropriate? Why not 1.5x or 100x?
The US govt never fines anywhere close (Score:5, Informative)
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To the profits made. If you want a serious crackdown you're gonna have to elect pro consumer politicians like Liz Warren, Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Orcasio Cortez to office, and lots of them. That means showing up for your primary so you can vote for them in the first place too.
AOC? That's the path to losing. She's a liberal loose cannon. Warren will likely get the nomination, and I like the Warren of the early 2000s when she cared about citizens first. Bernie of the early 2000s also cared about citizens first. Unfortunately in the time since they decided that citizens were less important than the goal of importing enough voters that you can win elections regardless of the consequences to actual citizens. I just wish that when the open borders crowd gets their wish that they
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Pick any one you want, the Republican attack ads are still going to convince a lot of voters that they are communists bent on overthrowing American society, nuking Israel, aborting blacks to extinction and flooding the country with Mexican gang members.
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Pick any one you want, the Republican attack ads are still going to convince a lot of voters that they are communists bent on overthrowing American society, nuking Israel, aborting blacks to extinction and flooding the country with Mexican gang members.
I root for Trump to win in 2020. That way I can get out of California before the flood of open borders type immigration happens. Gov Newsom would open the flood gates of unlimited immigration today if he could. Given a Democrat president he just may get his wish. I'm out in a few years but I'd really like to leave before the wave. It will make selling my house easier and more profitable.
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Pick any one you want, the Republican attack ads are still going to convince a lot of voters that they are communists bent on overthrowing American society, nuking Israel, aborting blacks to extinction and flooding the country with Mexican gang members.
Wouldn't that just make Republicans vote for them?
Re: (Score:2)
Any discomfort around black people is far outweighed by their opposition to abortion. There's a long-running conspiracy theory, very popular in pro-life circles, that says legalised abortion is actually a grand plan to commit genocide. It's fed by taking various quotes out of context, ranging from Sanger in 1939 to Sanders in 2019, and interpreting them as an admission of genocidal intent.
She's a lose cannon Congress woman (Score:2)
Also, why the hell would I want anything _but_ loose cannons? The Establishment hasn't been good for anyone _but_ the establishment. They're the goons that shifted all our good tech jobs overseas and brought in H1-Bs for the ones we couldn't shift. Those people are not your friend (or mine).
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who doesn't play by the rules. This year on C-SPAN, AOC II: This Time It's Liberal! Also, why the hell would I want anything _but_ loose cannons? The Establishment hasn't been good for anyone _but_ the establishment. They're the goons that shifted all our good tech jobs overseas and brought in H1-Bs for the ones we couldn't shift. Those people are not your friend (or mine).
I'm very anti establishment. I rooted for Brexit and Trump both just for the sheer 'it didn't follow the script' joy of it. I actually donated to Bernie but wouldn't do so again due to his position change on open borders. AOC on the other hand is a loose cannon in the worst sense of it. She would be a counter example to the notion that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Besides, she believes I'm racist merely for the sin of being white. I just can't vote for such a bigot.
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To the profits made. If you want a serious crackdown you're gonna have to elect pro consumer politicians like Liz Warren, Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Orcasio Cortez to office, and lots of them. That means showing up for your primary so you can vote for them in the first place too.
Yes, if you hate the US economy and want a future of European-style anemic growth and perpetual high unemployment, you should definitely vote for those guys. They will certainly punish success wherever they find it. Oh, they'll punish misbehavior too, of course, but that just's a part of punishing everybody.
(Warren is less crazy than the other two, but she's a compulsive liar even by politician standards, so who knows what she'll actually do).
I don't really see any of that growth (Score:2)
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If you want Europe, move to Europe, FFS. I love America, and want to keep it America. Europe is like: right there. Just go. You could solve all your complaints, simple as that, but I think what your really want is to control other people.
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Missing the point (Score:4, Insightful)
But in 2019, Google appears none the worse for wear. Google's stock price has grown more than 260% since the time of its historic 2012 FTC penalty and the company's now worth more than $800 billion.
The goal of these fines is to correct the bad behavior, not put them out of business.
Re:Missing the point (Score:5, Insightful)
But in 2019, Google appears none the worse for wear. Google's stock price has grown more than 260% since the time of its historic 2012 FTC penalty and the company's now worth more than $800 billion.
The goal of these fines is to correct the bad behavior, not put them out of business.
Actually, considering how 'unfair' the right wing thinks the entire tech industry is to them, how they are being 'silenced' and 'censored' and that the tech industry in general is a giant conspiracy against them, their religion and their entire world view I'd think a government of paranoid conspiracy theory mongering wing nuts would be out to bankrupt the likes of Google and Facebook or to otherwise ensure that bits and pieces of these companies end up in the hands of the right people, like Murdoch, the Mercers, the remaining half of the Koch brothers and the rest of that ilk.
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How does something this stupid get modded up?
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Progressives. They're incapable of rational thought, but they're laser-sharp at tribal identification. Modding down everyone from the wrong tribe is what they think mod points are for.
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Progressives. They're incapable of rational thought, but they're laser-sharp at tribal identification.
The irony meter is off the charts!
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How does something this stupid get modded up?
I ask myself the same thing every time I watch a rally where Trump whines like a little bitch for hours surrounded by crowds of adoring right wingers. How did something this stupid get modded up into the White House?
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Oh? And why then is the fine sized so as to be completely irrelevant to them? Are the supposed to be ashamed or what? That would require a minimum of honor and decency on their part and they have amply demonstrated that they do not have any of that.
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They have already announced sweeping changes to data collection involving any content targeted at kids, even if the viewer is not a kid. So, yeah, the fine had an effect.
YouTubers are panicked about this, because YouTube's bots always seem to run wild and be massively overbroad. People making content for adults that might be mistaken as content for kids are worried about a significant revenue hit.
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Every time they've said "we're going to randomly fuck over content creators with rogue bots", they've followed through. And sometimes when they didn't announce it ahead of time, too.
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To correct everyone's bad behavior not just this offender and putting them out of business would send a strong message in that regard. The idea isn't to punish a company after the fact the idea is to make the penalties so severe that companies won't engage in this sort of behavior in the first place. At this point it is just the cost of doing business.
Why would they even change the behavior if it turned them a net profit with the fines?
Re:Missing the point (no YOU are) (Score:2)
But in 2019, Google appears none the worse for wear. Google's stock price has grown more than 260% since the time of its historic 2012 FTC penalty and the company's now worth more than $800 billion.
The goal of these fines is to correct the bad behavior, not put them out of business.
If the fine is SO INSIGNIFICANT that the stock goes UP (significantly) after they've been given a slap on the wrist, EXACTLY what penalty have they suffered?
Sure I agree with your point about NOT DESTROYING the company. BUT when the fine is LESS THAN ONE ANNUAL-QUARTER OF PROFIT I absolutely guarantee you the message being sent is "Nobody cares, do whatever you want"
Don't know? (Score:5, Insightful)
How could anyone credibly claim they don't know facebook is abusing the privacy of its users? That is preposterous. Anyone who invests in Facebook deserves to face the consequences of that choice. Investing in companies operating in shady grey practices needs to regularly result in crippling loses so that nobody will take the risk.
Fines are for Show only (Score:3)
You do not want to kill the golden goose that is running the most efficient spying and data collection businesses of all time on behalf of the US government do you? Things might change if Google and Facebook were to not just hand over whatever data the government wanted with a wink and a nudge, but Google and Facebook know better than that -- they are only permitted to stay in business by the government because of it. The "fines" are merely for show. Much the same way as corrupt police departments bust a few drug dealers associated with the criminal enterprises that they are getting payoffs from every once in a while "just to keep the good optics in the press".
You suck my dick and I'll suck yours! It is the American Way!
Meanwhile... (Score:2)
Now, after being given a record-breaking $170 million fine for allegedly violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, YouTube is changing things. YouTube has to stop collecting data on videos that target minors, meaning those won't be able to run with targeted ads. This is likely to push creators to take on more sponsorships from companies because they can no longer run a type of popular advertising on their channel. Creators who make videos that appeal to a younger audience or target children directly will also have to label their videos as such, and will lose some product abilities, including being able to send notifications. YouTube has also launched a dedicated Kids version of the site that can be accessed online, which exists alongside the YouTube Kids app.
Re: Meanwhile... (Score:2)
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Part of Long Established Pattern (Score:2)
This tap on the wrist (to a corporation with one thousand times this much cash on hand) is part of pattern long preceding the current administration, going back at least as far as the early 1990s. It is one of making the costs of corporate criminal activity at most small taxes on the profits gained, with no other consequences, so that it is an easy matter for bottom-line oriented business types (often with hefty compensation packages based on short term profit) to decide to break the law to make more money.
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If they want to get serious... (Score:5, Insightful)
People need to have that explained to them? (Score:3)
I mean, it does not get much more obvious than this, unless you have so little grasp of numbers that you cannot see that this sum is peanuts.
Remember... (Score:3)
Settlements are tax-deductible! :)
Real money (Score:2)
Make it $170 billion or even $17 billion and maybe they'd start to change.
So where's the $$? (Score:2)
170m is a lot of cheddar when it comes to helping kids out. What are they doing with the $$?
Incarceration Isn't a Real Solution (Score:3)
By Design (Score:1)
If you run a company, and knowingly overcharge millions of customers, in the extremely rare instance that you are penalized by the law, you are penalized under civil law. The Supreme Court recently ruled that you can, with a few lines buried deep in the fine print, write yourself out of the law altogether.
Law is designed to restrict the freedom of certain classes of people, successful company executives
Re: By Design (Score:1)