The EU says Meta may not be doing enough to protect kids.
  • natarey@lemmy.worldEnglish
    83·
    7 months ago

    This is like an article declaring, “EU Investigates MySpace for causing child addiction and harm” – the people they’re trying to protect don’t use that product any more. The time to do this investigation was fifteen years ago, and the US government should have been the ones to do it.

    Don’t get me wrong – fuck Facebook. I hope they have to pay billions. But the people that company is harming now are adults and the elderly. I’m sure fifteen years from now, once all those people are dead, there’ll be an in-depth investigation and legislation about it.

    • TheGrandNagus@lemmy.worldEnglish
      8·
      7 months ago

      Loads of young people use Instagram. And Messenger. And WhatsApp. Some have Threads. They own a few shitty mobile games companies.

      Then on top of that Facebook collects data for third parties too via their ad network.

      Going after Meta for this is 100% justified.

      • natarey@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        7 months ago

        Justified? Absolutely. Timely? Hardly.

        My point was it’s more than a decade too late, and all the EU will do is levy a minor fine that Meta won’t even blink at. The only country that could impose real consequences is the US, and they have no interest in anything that doesn’t benefit these nightmare cyberpunk megacorps.

        • TheGrandNagus@lemmy.worldEnglish
          3·
          7 months ago

          Of course it would’ve been better if it were present from the beginning. But I’m not going to complain about them doing the right thing now.

          And EU fines so far have proven to be quite the motivator. These aren’t the baby fines the US hands out.

          • natarey@lemmy.worldEnglish
            2·
            7 months ago

            I was counting from when Facebook et al. became a clear problem — because, again, while I’m glad the EU is looking at this, it’s the US that has needed to take action. Their refusal to do so has left it to the EU to try to do something, and I’m skeptical that whatever they end up doing will make a difference. Like, if the price of the crime is a fine, then the crime is legal for a company as big as Meta.

              • natarey@lemmy.worldEnglish
                1·
                7 months ago

                Well, you’re more optimistic than I am, but I hope you’re right.

                The whole internet feels like it’s in a state of irrecoverable rot, and the last ten years have really tanked my confidence in governments to do anything about the clearly harmful, consumer hostile behavior inflicted on us — mostly because they seem to benefit a lot from letting Meta et al. do whatever they want. Like, EU fines, to date, have looked more like the organization wanting to wet their beak rather than fixing anything. I don’t know.