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A comment on Google removes Catalan referendum app from Google Play after court order. Parent comment

Re:Google removes Catalan referendum app from Google Play af... by barkingcat on Friday September 29, 2017 @04:39PM (#15368970)
Sure if you are prepared to go to war. At some point, a company will have enough funds to purchase its own military (aka corporate security department) to go toe-to-toe with a nation state's military. At that point, it would be a return to an era, for example, when the British East India Company can trade opium and wage war on behalf of the English government because they disagree with a country's internal anti-drug laws.
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Re:Google removes Catalan referendum app from Google Play af... by creaghpatr on Friday September 29, 2017 @04:44PM (#15369021)
In fact, Google purchased Boston Dynamics awhile back, although they sold to another tech giant, Softbank.

https://www.engadget.com/2017/06/08/softbank-boston-dynamics...

Cyberpunk speculating aside, I'm pretty sure Big Food companies (Coke, Monsonto, Kraft, etc) have private security contractors - due to the sheer amount of physical assets they control, it would be irresponsible to shareholders if they didn't.

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Re:Google removes Catalan referendum app from Google Play af... by tomjakubowski on Friday September 29, 2017 @05:26PM (#15369371)
Coca Cola's bottling partner in Colombia was, quite famously, accused of using mercenaries to murder labor organizers in the early 00s. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/07/26/world/union-says-coca-cola...

Similar accusations were made against Coke's Guatemalan bottler a few years back. Of course, about a hundred years ago it wasn't uncommon for companies to use hired muscle to harass, beat, and even murder labor activists in the United States. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludlow_Massacre

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Re:Google removes Catalan referendum app from Google Play af... by throwaway613834 on Friday September 29, 2017 @04:54PM (#15369123)
> At some point, a company will have enough funds to purchase its own military

I don't expect funding is the only big barrier between a company and its possession of a military force here.

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Re:Google removes Catalan referendum app from Google Play af... by barkingcat on Friday September 29, 2017 @05:17PM (#15369302)
I think hiring contractors is sufficient these days. The governments do it, no reason that companies can't. In Iraq, many companies hire the exact same outfits as the Pentagon.
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