The worst thing a company can do is try to sell you more soap. The government on the other hand can literally ruin your life (or even end it in some countries).
The EU is doing a fantastic job of keeping everyone distracted by pointing the finger at the "evil American tech companies" while simultaneously doing the opposite when it comes to privacy from government...which is the real threat.
I could point to many instances of this but the easiest one is the EU commission currently pushing a ban on encryption.
EU data practices differ significantly from tech giants; they're governed by strict GDPR rules, requiring consent for personal data processing.
No EU nation systematically tracks citizens like tech companies do for ads.
It's difficult to compare the data collection practices of EU nations directly with those of large tech companies like Facebook or Google, there are some parallels and distinctions to be made.
The encryption debate is separate, focusing on balancing privacy with security.
My take (being in EU) is that with weaker encryption, the EU tries to balance privacy with law enforcement needs, aiming to curb illicit communications while raising privacy concerns.
This is false. May I introduce you to chat control or client side scanning on every device that you own?
That what is the proposal is currently. All the data would be funneled to Europol, which would have access to every text, every image , every thing you do on your messaging apps. Does that sound like consent to you?
> My take (being in EU) is that with weaker encryption, the EU tries to balance privacy with law enforcement needs, aiming to curb illicit communications while raising privacy concerns.
You can have encryption or no encryption. If the EU can read your messages, so can China, Russia, Iran and anybody else who either buys their way into the system or breaks in illegally.
> It's difficult to compare the data collection practices of EU nations directly with those of large tech companies like Facebook or Google, there are some parallels and distinctions to be made.
That's right at least with GDPR, companies have to delete my data after a certain amount of time but some governments of Europe don't have too. There is this thing called data retention:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_Retention_Directive
It's been illegal for some time now but some governments in Europe (France for example) have decided that they don't care and keep doing it. Welcome to the land of privacy.