Of course, because vast variety of businesses had no security whatsoever and a bunch of PII could just be accessed by anyone on file share.

Vast majority of cases are "we haven't even tried in the first place"

And majority of fines are in range of 4 to low 5 digit.

At least from what I observed the "mistakes" are generally fined pretty low if organization can prove it took necessary steps in goodwill, but stuff like "not telling users about the breach" is treated VERY harshly

One of the small businesses in question wanted to use Shopify and got fined.

Then use provider that respects privacy. You guys would give up your rights for a pack of chips..

It’s funny for someone to claim that we would give up our rights when you are begging the government to limit your choices instead of using your own free will to choose based on your priorities.

The EU is constantly taking away your right to choose which companies you want to use and it’s being celebrated

> you are begging the government to limit your choices instead of using your own free will to choose based on your priorities

This is the "pro-crack-den" argument. Boring, boilerplate libertarian dogma.

So you’re not capable of choosing which websites you go to?

This is a non-sequitur response.

* * *

> If you don’t like the policies of a particular company, don’t use their products.

So you're saying that the crack houses should be legal and open to all. Cool.

As opposed to the War on Drugs that just focused on minorities and the fact that cocaine has a lot lower penalties than the same amount of crack because of who uses it?

Or do you mean that when the drug epidemic hit “rural America” politicians started treating it “as a disease” instead of a moral failure when it was all about the “inner city” drug problem?

But either way, are you comparing going to a web page that stores data in the US that you can choose not to go to going to a crack house?

> One of the small businesses in question wanted to use Shopify and got fined. reply

Citation needed. Who? This example seems very fictional, as shopify operates in the EU. "handle the sensitive financial data". is literally what such services do for their clients.

* * *

I see.

It hasn't been big news since then, so in the six months since then, did shopify manage to conduct their business legally, or did the business go to one of their several competitors who cares more about operating legally in the EU?

IDK, is this related? https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/eu-says-sho... https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_22_...

"Company complies with consumer safety law" is hard to spin as a bad thing, but go on, what have you got in that regard?

The Shopify announcement was regarding fake goods. It was not regarding the GDPR

> complaints mainly related to web stores hosted by the platform, found to have engaged in illegal practices, such as making fake offers and fake scarcity claims, supplying counterfeit goods or not providing their contact details.

The GDPR basically makes it illegal for an EU online business to use any SaaS service in the US or in this case Canada.

* * *

> No, only if they cannot comply with the law.

So exactly how is an EU citizen suppose to use a service like Shopify - that has to store PII - and that’s not based in the EU?

> That is the opposite of true. I've seen it help internally at a data storage level, and seen people make use of it to protect themselves. You do not know what you are talking about.

And it also killed a small business who wanted to use Shopify to sell completely legal things.

Not to mention that the same EU that is being applauded for “protecting your privacy” is trying to get a law passed so they can have a backdoor to any W2s encrypted methods.

It’s not that they want to protect your privacy. They just want to be the only ones who can surveil you.