Ask Lemmy
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What makes it impossible? Why would any given instance maintainer be responsible for the data on someone else's instance? Would it not fall on the GDPR requester to make that request of each individual instance?
So then if someone requests that Gmail delete all their email data, is Google then responsible for making sure any emails sent out from it's server to another is also deleted from those external servers?
Just in case you guys are wondering, there’s probably dozens of us enjoying the fuck out of this conversation. Thank you for asking questions I wouldn’t think of asking. On behalf of all three of us lurking.
Lol yeah this is great.
I really want to hear the answer to this
I don't have the answer but I think of it like this.
Email is essentially a direct conversation between you and someone in the same room but you may extend (cc) to those people in the house. There is an implicit "I am including you in the conversation"
Lemmy on the other hand is more akin to talking to someone in a crowded bar but the conversation is recorded and anyone over the world has the ability to listen to the conversation at any given time.
Apples and oranges.
Interesting perspective, but then cannot we consider that Lemmy users are aware that they are including all of the Fediverse in their conversation? That way Lemmy instances could be treated in the same way email providers are
See https://gdpr-info.eu/issues/right-to-be-forgotten/
Once the "controller has made the personal data public", they have legal obligations. Gmail doesn't make my data public, generally.
Hm, I see. A shortcoming of the law, when they probably did not imagine something such as Lemmy or Mastodon happening. By the way, how does Mastodon deal with that? They've been around for much longer
I checked Mastodon briefly. It appears they are currently not in compliance. There are open issues on GitHub, but nothing looks close.
Interesting, thanks!
But the controller is not making the data public. The user is.
See https://gdpr-info.eu/issues/right-to-be-forgotten/
Once the "controller has made the personal data public", they have legal obligations. When you send an email, you are not making it public.
Essentially yes, it's called the Right to Erasure or the Right to be Forgotten. If the user is in a country that adheres to GDPR and the company controlling the data operates in a country that also uses GDPR, then that right applies.
The only reason Google/Gmail wouldnt delete (or wouldn't be able to delete) some of your data would be if they had a lawful or legitimate basis for holding onto it.
I can't think of a reason Google would give for hanging on to your data but that doesn't mean there isn't one, but they'd have to notify you of that reason as part of their response to your request.
Unless these instances are showing ads and selling data, I'm pretty sure they're protected from the law. Not only that but if you're not hosting in the EU that law doesn't apply to you.
The problem here is how does that work? If I host something in the USA, how is someone going to bring a lawsuit towards me if I am also in the USA?
Asking honest questions here. As this just sounds like a lot of chest thumping from the EU.
"Provided your company doesn't specifically target its services at individuals in the EU, it is not subject to the rules of the GDPR."
Just say, we don't provide or target EU individuals and you're free.
Don't allow users from the EU to sign up? Is that your plan?
No, just say in the Terms, that the target audience isn't the EU.
Seems to be the plan for an increasing number of social media companies. As far as Lemmy is concerned, if it and other related services get killed, that just drives us underground to the darknet and the old tried and true chat services still being used there. As the old saying goes, can't stop the signal, and every empire falls to ruin eventually. We'll see how long it takes for Rome to crumble this time.
Wouldn't it be easier to fix the delete federation bug so Lemmy could comply with GDPR ?
Yeah, but if you don't have any assets in the EU for them to seize, and if you're not present in the bloc yourself it doesn't matter for shit. They have no jurisdiction or ability to enforce unless you really, really want to operate inside of their market at scale.
See https://gdpr-info.eu/issues/right-to-be-forgotten/
Once the "controller has made the personal data public", they have legal obligations.
Yes, but "the controller" is one instance, and it's certainly easy for one instance to allow a user to be forgotten. You can purge the user from the instance. Then they are forgotten, as far as the instance is concerned.
As an example, just because someone makes a GDPR request on YouTube to delete a video, does not require Google to actually remove the video from the whole internet. There are plenty of websites that archive content which are unaffected by that GDPR request. It's the exact same thing with different Lemmy instances, just because you ask lemm.ee to delete your content does not mean that lemmy.world needs to delete your content.
The GPDR doesn't require Lemmy to remove personal data from the entire internet. But when a Lemmy instance gives data to other Lemmy instance, there are legal responsibilities.
https://gdpr-info.eu/art-17-gdpr/ Where the controller has made the personal data public and is obliged pursuant to paragraph 1 to erase the personal data, the controller, taking account of available technology and the cost of implementation, shall take reasonable steps, including technical measures, to inform controllers which are processing the personal data that the data subject has requested the erasure by such controllers of any links to, or copy or replication of, those personal data.
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Maybe this is open to interpretation, but I feel that the same Federation protocol that federates out my personal data (my posts and comments), should also federate out my delete requests. I'm unsure why this would be controversial.