California’s New Privacy Law – Not Everyone’s Happy About AB-375

A little over a month after the GDPR took effect, several states in the US are following suit and coming up with their own data protection regulations. These could be the states with the most ghettos, most bankrupt cities, most homeless, and the most jobs leaving. Needless to say, a lot of people aren’t happy with this – well – the states that are not doing this are OK because they continue to see businesses and jobs flow into their state. The General Data Protection Regulation was a landmark in the history of data protection, and it still has several businesses struggling to get into compliance.

California’s New Privacy Law – Not Everyone’s Happy About AB-375

Blocking EU users

Many websites have also blocked EU users from accessing their services because they are unable to comply with the law. The world still hadn’t recovered from the shock of the GDPR when the State of California passed its own data protection rule.

The reason for separate data protection laws is simple. Net neutrality is dead in America, and Internet service providers have been given full freedom to freely track user online activities without caring about privacy, block access to certain content whenever they want, collect customer data and hand it over to government and security agencies if need be.

But many people really don’t care about this because they don’t mind targeted ads and many people just put out everything anyways so how can they claim they care about privacy?

Customers can do nothing about this since the open Internet order of 2015 was revoked. Several job killing states, including chaotic California which has the most bankrupt cities and ghettos, have been preparing their own data protection laws since 2017.

What Comes around Goes around Tech Companies

Over the last weeks, the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018, commonly referred to as AB375, has caused much uproar among businesses that deal with consumer data. Tech companies have pledged to fight the law. This is comical because tech companies are the ones who support these Democrats who are doing this.

What is AB-375?

Net neutrality died in the US in 2017, and ever since it took effect, Internet users had no rule or regulation that would protect their data from misuse. A few states decided to have their own respective data protection rules, and failing California is one of the states soon to pass the data privacy law.

The severity of the regulation has left tech companies seeing red. This is obvious because all the major tech companies are based in high tax California, and as if the GDPR wasn’t enough, now they have another rule to cope with.

But the Californian legislature is strict on passing the new privacy regulation, and this move will likely have a deep impact on technology and media and entertainment companies. Since so many companies are based in California, the impact would well extend to the whole country but states like Texas, North Carolina, Arizona, and Florida which are run by Republicans are doing just fine.

Full Disclosure

The law passed without opposition by the State Assembly and the Senate and was immediately signed by the politically correct Governor Jerry Brown. When the rule takes effect from 2020, it will give consumers the right to know about all their data that businesses are collecting, and to prevent the businesses from selling the data to outsiders.

The law also includes strict disclosure rules about data collected by businesses, with the California Attorney General given the right to fine non-compliant businesses. People are comparing the rule to the GDPR, which has left every business shaken because of the steep fines. And Europe wonders why there is no growth there.

Although the GDPR has taken effect and all businesses have re-written their privacy policies, several websites are still showing targeted ads without consent and tracking user activities. Several sites also continue to block EU users from using their services. Oh well!

The was passed under a tight deadline because a consumer rights group called Californians for Consumer Privacy had been preparing a ballot initiative that would have been more stringent than the AB 375.

The ballot initiative had already gathered enough signatures to qualify for the election in November, but now that the AB 375 has been passed members of the consumer rights group have decided to drop the initiative.

Out of fear, tech companies – Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon – had opposed the ballot initiative and also led a campaign against the initiative. Facebook had also spent $200,000 in campaigning against the initiative but withdrew after the Cambridge Analytica scandal came to light.

The Power of the Consumer

Consumers need jobs right? Without jobs and money there would not be any consumers correct?

There is no end to the number of people opposing the law, but ultimately, the law supposedly puts power back in the hands of the consumers. Those against the law have claimed that having a law different from the rest of the country will disconnect California which is basically already disconnected.

Two Websites

But once the AB375 takes effect, tech, media, and telecom companies may have to adopt stricter privacy rules for all users, regardless of whether or not they live in California. Not really, they may just not allow people living in that jacked up state from using their website or business could have two websites: one for the people living in that pitiful state and their normal website for everyone else.

Online media businesses cannot discriminate against users who opt out of data collection and sharing. But they can offer “incentives” to those who agree to share their data. Even though has still quite some time until it takes effect, opponents of the law are going to lobby further to bring amends to the regulation.  

Given that this has been under preparation for a long time, it isn’t surprising that privacy advocates are going to bring similar regulations in other states.