14 ms·

Court decides "Pay or Okay" on DerStandard.at is illegal

47 points by tomwas54 1y ago

Frieren 1y ago
At this point I think that this kind of tracking should be forbidden by law. People should not have an option to accept "being spied at all times on their personal behavior". It is creepy, it is dangerous and it is inhuman. The exceptions should be the ones that currently already exist in GDPR. Financial institutions can use data to track fraud, law enforcement can use data from ongoing criminal cases, etc. To have an option "to be spied" is a dystopian result of the lawlessness and bad faith on the Internet.
- juliangmp 1y ago
  This! What benefit does any of this current system provide us anyway?
  - Dilettante_ 1y ago
    Devil's Advocate? It pays for the services we use for free.
    - Ukv 1y ago
      I feel that's only really true in the way it is of a JS bitcoin miner. Locally appears to make something free (if ignoring time/energy) that wasn't before, but is overall a detriment to average affordability because it's a net loss of resources (mostly just a zero-sum game, with some small side benefits).
      - Dilettante_ 1y ago
        I don't disagree with that at all, and by 'free' I suppose I didn't even mean 'as in free beer', I just meant there was no financial transaction taking place. Maybe at some point we're really gonna see an upfront-micropayment structure as some people have mused about.
    - watwut 1y ago
      "Free" services that are unable to pay for themselves distort the market. And eventually they price out honest and non tracking competition.
    - bcye 1y ago
      From another noyb article: personalized ads account for < 10% of revenue for newspapers
borzi 1y ago
Absolutely crazy interpretation: "At the same time, only 1-7% of all users want to be tracked for online advertisement if asked openly. However, "pay or okay" gets 99.9% of users to agree to online tracking. If more than 90% of users do not get what they genuinely want, we have everything but a "genuine" choice." If I got to the shop and don't want to buy the product I should just get it for free, because that is what I genuinely want? Genuine choice = I get to choose exactly what I want, always? Edit, because people seem to miss the point: Just because populist politicians want to legally restrict business from offering a choice does not mean that a "genuine" choice is not presented.
- watwut 1y ago
  Tracking is not payment nor is the company entitled to track people. Der Standard is free to ask for money. They are not free to make tracking condition of a service.
- Nextgrid 1y ago
  The law says that personal data is not a valid form of payment. Businesses have to adjust their business models accordingly.
  - mytailorisrich 1y ago
    Isn't offering paid access exactly that? Or what do you have in mind?
    - yladiz 1y ago
      Paid access is okay, so is showing advertising, and even requiring that you pay to access a service (they don’t have to give it away for free). What isn’t okay is requiring either paying or selling your data (selling away privacy) for advertising. So yes businesses are doing something okay by offering a paid version, but it doesn’t matter if they’re saying “pay or let us sell your data” as the latter is illegal.
      - 1y ago
account42 1y ago
This is great but how can we disincentivize businesses from trying to play games like this with the law? Simply telling them to stop once someone had to go through a lengthy court case against them is not going to be enough.
Havoc 1y ago
Conflating payment and consent into one choice is complete nonsense anyway

47 points by tomwas54 1y ago

At this point I think that this kind of tracking should be forbidden by law. People should not have an option to accept "being spied at all times on their personal behavior". It is creepy, it is dangerous and it is inhuman. The exceptions should be the ones that currently already exist in GDPR. Financial institutions can use data to track fraud, law enforcement can use data from ongoing criminal cases, etc. To have an option "to be spied" is a dystopian result of the lawlessness and bad faith on the Internet.

juliangmp 1y ago
This! What benefit does any of this current system provide us anyway?
- Dilettante_ 1y ago
  Devil's Advocate? It pays for the services we use for free.
  - Ukv 1y ago
    I feel that's only really true in the way it is of a JS bitcoin miner. Locally appears to make something free (if ignoring time/energy) that wasn't before, but is overall a detriment to average affordability because it's a net loss of resources (mostly just a zero-sum game, with some small side benefits).
    - Dilettante_ 1y ago
      I don't disagree with that at all, and by 'free' I suppose I didn't even mean 'as in free beer', I just meant there was no financial transaction taking place. Maybe at some point we're really gonna see an upfront-micropayment structure as some people have mused about.
  - watwut 1y ago
    "Free" services that are unable to pay for themselves distort the market. And eventually they price out honest and non tracking competition.
  - bcye 1y ago
    From another noyb article: personalized ads account for < 10% of revenue for newspapers

borzi 1y ago

Absolutely crazy interpretation: "At the same time, only 1-7% of all users want to be tracked for online advertisement if asked openly. However, "pay or okay" gets 99.9% of users to agree to online tracking. If more than 90% of users do not get what they genuinely want, we have everything but a "genuine" choice." If I got to the shop and don't want to buy the product I should just get it for free, because that is what I genuinely want? Genuine choice = I get to choose exactly what I want, always? Edit, because people seem to miss the point: Just because populist politicians want to legally restrict business from offering a choice does not mean that a "genuine" choice is not presented.

watwut 1y ago
Tracking is not payment nor is the company entitled to track people. Der Standard is free to ask for money. They are not free to make tracking condition of a service.
Nextgrid 1y ago
The law says that personal data is not a valid form of payment. Businesses have to adjust their business models accordingly.
- mytailorisrich 1y ago
  Isn't offering paid access exactly that? Or what do you have in mind?
  - yladiz 1y ago
    Paid access is okay, so is showing advertising, and even requiring that you pay to access a service (they don’t have to give it away for free). What isn’t okay is requiring either paying or selling your data (selling away privacy) for advertising. So yes businesses are doing something okay by offering a paid version, but it doesn’t matter if they’re saying “pay or let us sell your data” as the latter is illegal.
    - 1y ago

account42 1y ago

This is great but how can we disincentivize businesses from trying to play games like this with the law? Simply telling them to stop once someone had to go through a lengthy court case against them is not going to be enough.

Havoc 1y ago

Conflating payment and consent into one choice is complete nonsense anyway