It's not about earnings. Having datacenters in europe would still require them to respect the laws in europe. They need those datacenters for latency and plenty of other reasons. If they were forced to only reside in the US or in Europe it would make for a shitty experience for where they are not.

And going to europe isn't really feasible when most of the developers they hire come from the US. They could come to Canada if they want (they already have offices but they could just move the head office.) :)

Basically this is another law that fails to face the reality of globalization and is a strong overreach of the US Gov. It's potentially also destroying jobs if companies as you say must choose a place to be in.

I wonder if it's a structural problem: if the problem is that the parent incorporation is in the US rather than the US incorporation being a subsidiary of a holding company in e.g. the Cayman Islands. That seems like it'd be a solvable, if massively annoying problem.

Good point,it would also be interesting to know if this affects any business that does business in the US or only US based. My bet is it's the former (I am not a lawyer). Just because of the loophole you exposed. Think of all the foreign banks.

what should companies do when they are subject to two mutually exclusive laws? they don't really have a choice: they need to break one of the laws, and pay the penalty for that. the only question is which law to break, and the answer to that is the one with fewer consequences.

The EU must enact sanctions against google for this, if they don't they are essentially letting all multinationals know that EU laws are less important than American laws.

No, you've missed a possibility: their only legal option is not to operate in both countries for as long as the laws are incompatible.

That will, in this particular case, probably result in a significant dent in both the US and EU economies in the immediate future, followed by a phenomenal boost to the European economy at the expense of the US in the longer term. That will continue until the US understands that it can't just impose its will on other countries around the world any time it feels like it, and more specifically that while the US government and big business don't care much about privacy, it is a fundamental societal value in several EU countries.

The only legal option is to creat a world government, possibly extend the authority of UN. Governments need to match the size of multinational corporations.

I don't think that really solves the problem. People are different, and societies have different collective values. That diversity is IMHO valuable, and in case, it's probably unavoidable. Trying to force everyone into the same template seems to me a Very Bad Idea.

I think we do much better with our current model, where each jurisdiction has its own legal and ethical norms, jurisdictions may reach multilateral agreements on areas of common interest, and anyone wanting to operate across jurisdictions needs to do so in a way that is compatible with everywhere they operate and any common agreements between those places. In this case, economic incentives for major multinationals to be able to operate across borders is, or at least should be, a compelling reason for national governments to accept their limitations and not try to exert influence beyond their borders in unsustainable ways.

>That diversity is IMHO valuable, and in case, it's probably unavoidable. Trying to force everyone into the same template seems to me a Very Bad Idea.

That's what the European Union is about.

> That's what the European Union is about.

That's what some people would like the EU to be about. Fortunately, there is a healthy diversity in people's views on that issue just as with many other issues. Thus, in practice, we have always had European integration on several different levels depending on the individual needs of the nations involved and their collective benefit from co-operation.

Today, being in the EU is not the same as using the Euro. Though the Lisbon Treaty blurred a lot of lines, we historically had the European Courts of Justice rather separate from the European Union as well. There is a lot more historical detail on Wikipedia's page on the EU if you're interested.

If anyone thinks Europe will still look the same in five years, I think they are probably missing something, given the obvious differences in financial power between say Germany and Greece today and the obvious negative effects it is having on the better off nations. Who knows the consequences at this stage? Maybe the result will be closer integration where the financial policies of the weaker nations are restricted by the stronger nations who support them. Maybe Europe will fracture as an economic community but perhaps continue as a legal, diplomatic, free trade, and/or military one. It is clear that on matters like the privacy issue at hand, there is a lot of common ground on the basic principles regardless of economics, so I suspect that side of things will be maintained.

I'm merely guessing, but seeing how the law takes a backseat when security and anti-terror are involved I suppose that EU governments and the US have reached some sort of agreement about which set of laws to enforce in certain cases.

> the law takes a backseat when security and anti-terror are involved

Read that statement. Again. Are you worried yet?

Are you saying that Europe is not governed by law, and citizens protections are optional there, or just that this is what happens in the USA?

If the former, I hope Europe can fix that. If the latter, why is Europe's problem?

My guess is that such an "agreement" would have been reached by one side only...

The law has been taking much less of a backseat in Europe when it comes to security and anti-terror. Also I find it hard to believe that the EU would just give up its data protection laws just to please Americans and allow the enforcement of an American law.

I definitely agree with you on the one sided part..

I'm less concerned by the fact that Google handled the data over US agencies than by the fact that the EU doesn't seem to have made any objections.

Whether it's because the EU doesn't care, or because they was nothing they could possibly do, I don't know. But either way, it doesn't sound right to me.

Which is exactly what the EU did with bank and flightdata. The EU will make a bit of a fight and then simply back down. Like they always do.

Which is possibly preferable for every US-company which thus do not have to challenge your agencies.

Which is not what they always do. Microsoft got some nice fines from the EU, I think more than once even.

I think we Europeans as a diverse society have far less willingness to give up basic rights than those in the US.

Public sentiment does sway sharply in the aftermath of events like 9/11 (or, in our cases, 7/7 in London and the like). We sometimes tolerate nanny state behaviour and suspending basic rights and freedoms more than I personally would like following such extreme, high-profile events.

However, even then, public sentiment seems to sway back again much faster here. Just look at the level of public concern over a tiny number of high profile deaths in the UK in recent years where police were involved, or look at how sharply Google have been slapped down over privacy in places like Germany. I think this is probably down to having a lot of very different cultures who have come together in their common interest but never merged to the extent that the US is a federation of relatively similar states. Consequently we have a much broader spectrum of political opinions permanently in play here and it's much harder to permanently overrule many years of history and precedent without someone objecting loudly enough to slow things down and force more debate.

There seems to be an inherent tension between recognising that the US is often a useful partner in economic and military matters, and recognising that we must not act as some sort of junior partner to a country that frequently gets big issues spectacularly wrong and that has a demonstrated history of screwing its partners whenever its own interests dictate.

My sense is that the US has been cut a lot of slack in recent years because of its economic strength and 9/11, particularly when we had Blair running the show here in the UK, but that public patience with the one-sided deals and all the silliness we have to put up with as a result is now rapidly running out as we have our own problems to deal with and the US are getting in the way or indeed causing some of them.