> I would start some sort of embargo, countries that enforce these kind of rules, simply ban all traffic from the country.
I wonder how it would work the opposite way: Start redirecting google.co.uk to uk.google.com, hosted and operated by a non-UK corporate entity outside of UK jurisdiction. Make them block you. China would do it; would Britain?
Those should only apply to users accessing from those nations
It is a complex issue for a global company for sure, but I do not want the internet to be censored down to the lowest common denominator of Government regulations.
A Person in nation X should not have to be censored under the laws of nation Y
>As a good faith question - if you were an American, how would you create a site or service for a domestic audience without insulting the rest of the world?
First I would say that I don't think I've been, or particularly seen others, be offended by sites that are clearly targeted at a US/North American audience while still being more widely accessible. Usually I am happy that being an English speaker gets me access to a wider set of things on the internet than would otherwise be specifically targeted for where I live. I'd say this is fairly true up until the scale of a company with international presence and operations.
Yes there is going to be some vocal minority who behave in an entitled manner and loudly complain that something didn't meet their personal expectations, but this is a small minority and not representative of the wider English-using-international audience.
If a site is open and upfront about what they are doing then I wouldn't have any issue. Examples might be using geolocation to restrict access or just having some note making clear that 'this service is for X, use it elsewhere at your own risk'.
A good example of this is the range of approaches different sites have taken to GDPR compliance (or that awful cookie law compliance!) following its implementation by the EU and the non-EU countries that have adopted it.
Some non-EU sites (possibly based in the US but also plenty of others elsewhere) have used geolocation to restrict access from the EU, others have implemented those consent banners, others have done nothing. However I don't think it is reasonable to blame a company doing any of these, ultimately we are benefitting from the protections the new law provides - if we don't like the wider implications of that then we need to take that up with our lawmakers, not a foreign company located somewhere with their own set of data protection laws.
The change for me occurs when a company is an international entity. I realise this is a bit of a grey line as to what defines this, but hopefully we'd all agree that FAANG meets this definition. When you're actively engaged with international markets and generating significant revenue in countries around the world I think it is a reasonable expectation that you either: a) make services culturally and linguistically localised; or b) more carefully target a service to some specific regions.
TLDR - at a small scale, if you are open & clear about your intentions I don't think you need to worry about 'insulting the rest of the world' - if you get significant traction in another country you should probably open a dialogue with that user base to understand their views.
> It seems strange to me to have this enforcement of policies from countries that are not my own just because my website is accessible from those countries.
If you open shop in a different country, you follow their laws. Your website being accessible in a country is seen as the same thing. It's not hard to implement geo blocking if you want to show best effort and thereby opt out of it.
> geo blocking for UK IPs (like 99% of websites will)
Nahh, they'll just ignore UK law just like they ignore other countries laws. I mean, do you really expect every website owner to be versed in every single country's laws? There's no way!
Unless they "do business" in a specific country (e.g. selling goods/services) there's not really any downside to just ignoring that country's laws (when it comes to website/data stuff).
I don't plan to ever sell stuff to say, Guyana and never plan to go there. Why should I care what their laws are regarding websites/data collection? It's completely irrelevant.
> why the UK would allow their constituents most personal data to be transferred out of their jurisdiction
Are there limitations with using products/doing business outside the UK, from within the UK? As in, is there any authority that they could use to stop people from, willingly(?), using a foreign internet service? It seems that would require some pretty draconian internet policies.
> They might need to intervene with remote work as well.
Do you mean all boundary gateways should censor all information and knowledge, that are past without prior authorisation or a heavy tax, by default? Because that is how customs IRL work.
> What if I refuse to provide visitor logs, is it OK for them to block my site at the border? What about to order a private teleco to block my site?
That depends exclusively on the laws of the country in question, not on the laws of the country the offender is based on. That's what a sovereign state does, it determines its own rules.
> But consider the implications. Firms hosting content from a particular country would be subject to court orders from every country. That would not end well.
They already are if they target users in a given country. Lack of international enforcement just means that they might escape enforcement. See also GDPR, the US case against Mega, a company run by a NZ resident and incorporated in Hongkong IIRC. See also how Twitter blocks certain tweets in certain countries lest they’re blocked completely. Same holds true for Facebook. Google censors certain autocomplete and searches in some countries. They also adhere to the EU “right to be forgotten” regulations - despite being an US company.
>If I run, say, a porn site, hosted in the US, as a US company, is it my responsibility to prevent users in a country where pornography is illegal from using my sit
Actually you have in most cases as trade agreements and various treaties usually provide the framework to extend laws and regulations between countries.
Gambling sites for example wether they are run from the UK, Malta or CAR explicitly block US users due to US laws which prevent online gambling.
If you are running a gambling site even in some 3rd world non extradition country if you do not respect the UIGEA you'll be sanctioned and an arrest warrant will be issued faster than you can say poker stars.
| "So, 'let's whack off the DNS'. Okay, that seems like an appealing solution but it sets a very bad precedent because now another country will say 'I don't like free speech so I'll whack off all those DNSs' -- that country would be China.
How exactly does one whack off a DNS? That seems pretty inappropriate.
> - login required to view content, no search engine spidering
Why do you think this is a good thing?
> - servers and legally based in a country the US and EU cannot control
I see two ways that could go: either somewhere that China and/or Russia have control over, or in an unstable third-world dictatorship. Do you have any specific countries where none of the above would apply, or do you prefer one of the latter two to the US and EU?
> it doesn't make sense to restrict DNS based on geopolitical boundaries.
Sure it does because those geopolitical boundries make sense for things like e-commerce. As a Canadian, I know that a site having a .ca domain will definitely ship to my address.
Easy answer: geoblock the UK.
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