In case you were wondering why so many online sites are updating their privacy policy

[sukumvit boy]

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/23/technology/personaltech/what-you-should-look-for-europe-data-law.html

[Stavros]

There are a couple of issues here I don't know how to resolve. It doesn't affect me directly because I have very few accounts online, and those that I do have are mostly libraries and archives, or commercial retailers like Caffe Nero and Costa Coffee (because I use their WiFi), Amazon, and the regional train company that I use. I do not use online banking or Facebook, or Twitter or any of that sort of thing and definitely do not have a Google account.

For those that do I wonder if they resent or welcome the impact the European Union is having, with or without their judgement of what went wrong with Facebook and the US elections in 2016; just as we in the EU should both ignore and protest at the threats the US is making to firms that trade with Iran as well as the USA.

But is this a means whereby the 'State' can exert more control over the Internet? It has long been clear that the Internet can be useful or damaging to government, the rule of law, democracy and so forth, but other than simply shutting it down or blocking large parts of it, as they do in China, is this the 'thin edge of a wedge' that politics is using to place limits on what can be accessed online?

I don't have any answers to this, but if I were pessimistic, I would suggest we are moving toward internet control and that cannot be a good thing, even with the garbage and criminality that is there, but which is in society in other forms anyway.