Google, Dropbox the latest US tech giants to sign up to the Privacy Shield

Internet giant Google has signed up to the Privacy Shield, a framework designed to facilitate the transfer of personal data between the EU and US by businesses. Data storage and software provider Dropbox has also self-certified under the Privacy Shield. The companies are the latest major US technology businesses to sign up to …

[Anonymous Coward]

Tick .. tock .. tick .. tock ..

Given EU statements on the matter, that Privacy Shield agreement won't be worth a bean if the US don't change their laws to support the concept of privacy as defined in Europe, and the chances of that are lower than Donald Trump becoming polite and sticking to facts.

They know they have only delayed their problems by about a year, so I guess there must be an impressive amount of money flowing to Brussels right now to fund all those lobbyists and expensive dinners. I reckon that may even work as there is plenty of room for negotiation, for example reduced fines for Deutsche Bank. After all, this is politics, not law, as Privacy Shield does very little for end users.

[Doctor Syntax]

Re: Tick .. tock .. tick .. tock ..

"After all, this is politics, not law, as Privacy Shield does very little for end users."

I think it will become law if Max Schrems has anything to do with it.

[Nick Ryan]

Re: Tick .. tock .. tick .. tock ..

IANAL but from what I can tell "Privacy Shield" is as useless and pointless as "Safe Harbour"... it's purely a voluntary agreement with no US based legal ramifications for violation and countless get out clauses for whatever US reasons happen to crop up for accessing the data outside of this agreement.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Tick .. tock .. tick .. tock ..

I think it will become law if Max Schrems has anything to do with it.

As able as Max Schrems has been able to get a boot up FB's backside using EU law, I fear his powers of persuasion will fall a tad short to upend a US legal structure that has been growing for over 2 decades, and which currently supports a lot of spectacularly dodgy and influential stakeholders who would not be enthusiastic about undoing 2 decades of hard work.

Even changing the very basics will take more than the length of a Presidential term, which is probably why it has been able to grow so uncontrolled. Translated this means that in a year there will be trouble again for US service providers selling to Europe. The good news (for them, not for EU users) is that Privacy Shield is not an arrangement dependent on law, but on politics, just like Safe Harbor was, and political arrangements appear far easier to reach. Less costly, as it were..

Now for the bonus question: I wonder what sort of arrangement the UK will have post Brexit. This could get interesting all by itself.

[streaky]

Re: Tick .. tock .. tick .. tock ..

Privacy Shield agreement won't be worth a bean if the US don't change their laws to support the concept of privacy as defined in Europe

Yup we're off to court again over this. Only thing - as I've said before - that can resolve this is a change in either US Constitutional Law (i.e. rewriting quite a lot of it) which won't happen or the EU accepting changes in The Charter which seems equally as unlikely.

There's no tidying around the edges which can fix the fundamental problem that the US in constitutional law doesn't recognise an EU citizen's right to privacy against warrantless (both explicit authorisation and ethical justification) invasion.

[Kirti]

Contrary to Dropbox's interface, that follows a file system hierarchy, all your files are hosted under the My Drive folder. Opening documents is a simple matter of tapping on them. Once you open, you can see who else is online and viewing the same file. I would say, Google drive is best. With dropbox, you can't edit documents.

[Kirti]

Google Drive Vs Dropbox

Contrary to Dropbox's interface, that follows a file system hierarchy, all your files are hosted under the MyDrive folder. Opening documents is a simple matter of tapping on them. Once you open, you can see who else is online and viewing the same file. I would say, Google drive is best. With dropbox, you can't edit documents.