this post was submitted on 26 Dec 2023
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That argument doesn't hold up when actual laws are being violated
The GDPR is a required to comply EU law for all websites in their jurisdiction. You can't get away with claiming "but people choose to join the website".
Many other websites and even major social media sites have gotten fined and other sanctions put against them already for violating it.
I ... think you have a deep failure to comprehend even the basics of how the software you're on works.
"Lemmy" is not a fucking web site. Lemmy is a piece of software. It can be running on a site in the EU, in which case the GDPR applies absolutely; those running it on sites outside the EU ... not so much.
The EU doesn't have global jurisdiction.
No, it has jurisdiction in the EU. And Lemmy is a part of the EU jurisdiction.
Unless the devs want to block everyone in the EU from accessing the site.
Lemmy instances are hosted all over the world, by people in a wide variety of jurisdictions. A particular instance of Lemmy might be risking trouble, but Lemmy as a whole (and the Fediverse as a whole) is not.
If I were to write up a simple forum server and post the code, and it happens to lack the ability to delete comments, I've done nothing wrong. Someone running that software in the EU might run into some trouble, but I'm not on the hook for that.
Silver already answered you. The fact that you can't fathom it is on you
Whose law?
The GDPR applies to servers running in Europe.
It does not apply to servers running in, say, Canada¹. Or China¹. Or South Africa¹. (If you try to claim European law is extraterritorial to non-European citizens, be prepared for the Nelson Muntz meme.)²
The very nature of the protocol in use makes any content anywhere on the Fediverse, no matter what the software, distributed. (It's almost like that's the very point of it! Almost...) And it could well be distributed into a jurisdiction where the GDPR is best used as toilet paper¹. If this bothers you, fuck off back to sites hosted entirely in Europe where the GDPR holds sway.²
Only wait! That's not true either! Because that other protocol you're likely to be using—HTTP(S)—also allows anybody who has access to the site from anywhere in the world to store it without being beholden to the GDPR!¹ Oopsie! Better make sure that site blocks any kind of access from outside of the EU as well!²
Only wait! That won't work either because VPN's are a thing as well! I can be sitting here in China with my IP address coming at you from, say, the Netherlands. (It doesn't. It comes at you from the USA 'cause that's where my Great Firewall-crossing back door is hosted.) And again, any post you make, were I to go to your web site in Europe through my (currently-hypothetical) European VPN endpoint, could be stored and held permanently with the GDPR being able to do precisely a) Fuck and b) All to about it.¹ Because European laws are not, in fact, extraterritorial to non-EU citizens, no matter how much wanking the EU parliament does about it.²
So it sounds like you should just shut off your Internet access. Or, you know, you could post knowing the reality of the world and moderate your content accordingly.
¹ Note: I am emphatically not saying that the GDPR is a bad thing. I think the GDPR's goals are laudable. It's just that the GDPR is ludicrous in the face of how literally every piece of technology used in web sites of any kind actually works. It is a regulation that is a nice idea but that has absolutely no meaningful way to get enforced. As the EU will find out over the years. Hopefully not the really hard way.
² Any claim of EU legal extraterritoriality is risible and needs to be rebuffed in the strongest possible way up to and including punching EU politicians who claim it in the face with a spiked gauntlet.
"You went into the Walmart that steals your liver by choice" 🤓
If it's a Walmart that's surrounded by dumpsters filled with corpses missing their livers, and the occasional bloody survivor comes running out screaming "they're after your liver! Don't go inside!" Before being dragged back in by Walmart greeters wielding meathooks, then even if what Walmart is doing is illegal I'd still be very unsympathetic if you walked in that door anyway.