"Big Brother" smaller in Europe?

San Francisco Chronicle ^ | 3/28/04 | Carolyn Said, staff writer

[mondoman]

Europe and America are worlds apart when it comes to privacy laws.

Privacy is a constitutional right in all European Union countries, which zealously safeguard personal information about their citizens. Each has its own data protection commissioner, a privacy watchdog roughly equivalent to the chairman of the Federal Trade Commission in the United States.

...in the United States, people are accustomed to giving out personal information, such as their Social Security number, on all manner of documents. And credit information is collected, sliced and diced by major corporations that use it as part of a relentless stream of marketing.

"The data flows in ways it could never flow in Europe," where the collection of personal information is tightly restricted, Davies said.

[mondoman]

For once, a well written, essentially "informational" article from SFC.

Personal data privacy is a topic of discussion that we have not heard much about. I found this wire service article in the local paper (Rocky Mountain News) and thought the Libertarians and Liberals lurking on FR would find this interesting and may care to comment as well as Freepers.

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[Eddie Dean]

So no European creditors offshore their back-offices to India?

Cuz that's where the biggest threat to American's privacy lies.

[mondoman]

Did you read the article? The writer specifically mentioned the US v. the European practices of off shoring data mining.

BTW I have personally observed US businesses utilizing prison labor here in the US, although not for data processing.

[Eddie Dean]

Whoops!

That's what I get for skimming!

[Zeppo]

The headline is grossly misleading. "Big Brother" normally refers to an intrusive government, not to private companies. I have every reason to believe that European governments are at least as Big Brother-ish as the US government, and perhaps more.

The privacy "guarantee" excerpted from Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights is laughable. It basically states that no public authority (whatever that means) may interfere with a person's privacy, except whenever they desire to interfere with that person's privacy. So, it basically says that "we (the government) can do whatever we want, but you (private individuals and companies) can not do what you want". It's a sham.

[Still Thinking]

I agree that I am more concerned about governmental intrusions of my privacy, but I don't like corporate ones either.

[Bonny Dick]

Only the socialists in San Francisco would believe that the socialist governments of Europe are less intrusive than our government.

[uncitizen]

There are video cameras at almost every street corner in London (or so i was told when we vacationed there). They watch there citizens closely. For there own good, i'm sure </sarcasm off>

[AdamSelene235]

There are video cameras at almost every street corner in London

Yeah, there are video cameras popping up at rural intersection in Colorado, now. Urban areas have them at every stop light.

[headsonpikes]

Only the socialists in San Francisco would believe that the socialist governments of Europe are less intrusive than our government.

Every nation's socialism bears its own national character.

'Socialism with American characteristics', to paraphrase Mao, seems to be the default mode of modern American politics.

See the Medicare program expansion for a recent example.

Or visit a public school - truly frightening.

[mondoman]

The information IS being collected; regardless of WHO parses and analyzes the data (government or business). If at some time Business and Government come together (hmmm, isn't that a definition of Fascism?) with access to the information, then they can quickly identify potential "trouble-makers".

Better to submit red-herrings with your personal data. CONFOUND THE illigetimi!

[TheDon]

Europe is very backwards in regards to privacy. It is an essential feature of the socialist gov'ts they have.