
Australia sues Facebook over Cambridge Analytica - ajaviaad
https://techcrunch.com/2020/03/09/australia-sues-facebook-over-cambridge-analytica-fine-could-scale-to-529bn/
======
poooogles
The fact that we (the UK) only fined Facebook £500k [1] is an utter scandal.
You can probably say $529bn is too much, but the appropriate amount might be
somewhere in the middle of the two...

1\. [https://techcrunch.com/2019/10/30/facebook-agrees-to-pay-
uk-...](https://techcrunch.com/2019/10/30/facebook-agrees-to-pay-uk-data-
watchdogs-cambridge-analytica-fine-but-settles-without-admitting-liability/)

~~~
roblabla
Facebook's revenue in 2019 was $70bn. $529bn is 7 times this. I don't think
Facebook even generated close to $529bn during the entirety of its lifetime.
This is not "probably say": $529bn would just not work.

EDIT: If the goal of the fine is to just kill Facebook's presence in
Australia, then yeah, I guess it works. But in this case, Facebook won't pay
that fine. They'll just stop operating in Australia - in other words, they'll
stop taking advertiser money from there. At worst, Australia's govt will block
access to FB.

~~~
munk-a
Still, it sounds like a reasonable amount for, as a company, designing a
system that helped compromise an election.

If FB needs to declare bankruptcy and shutter their doors then nothing of
value will be lost.

------
ztratar
No $529BN fine would ever actually happen.

That would be considered economic warfare and the US wouldn't allow it.

~~~
raz32dust
Why not? Isn't Australia free to not allow Facebook to operate in their
country if they don't pay a fine? And if the US prevents them from doing so by
retaliation or sanctions, that would actually be closer to warfare.

~~~
chillacy
The US almost certainly would, at least it did most recently when France
wanted to put a digital tax:
[https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/23/21078574/france-us-
digita...](https://www.theverge.com/2020/1/23/21078574/france-us-digital-tax-
deal-negotiations-tariffs-postponed-trump)

A consumption tax is a pretty good way to tax foreign companies though imo, as
long as your domestic market is desirable.

~~~
bilbo0s
> _The US almost certainly would_

What happened with China?

I know FB isn't really operating in China. (At least no one I knew in Ningbo
had it?) So did we sanction China for that or how did that all work? Because,
and I don't know if we did or didn't, but if we didn't sanction China, why
sanction Australia? Was that situation different somehow? (Other than just
"China's richer").

------
Upvoter33
facebook could turn their public perception around in a second by declaring
that it is not a political platform and banning political ads. I honestly
don't care how much they market me to coke and pepsi, but the impact on
democracies is way creepier...

~~~
omgwtfbbqhihihi
The problems with facebook run far deeper than just politics. If you think
that doing what you suggest would change perception you are sadly mistaken.

------
bilekas
Now THIS would be a fine that Facebook would surely feel!

I am assuming this is some Class Action suite ? Or is this different as its
from the privacy watchdog ?

~~~
nineteen999
It's a government body. So the Plaintiff in this case is presumably the
Australian Federal Government, in a case in our Federal Court.

[https://www.oaic.gov.au/](https://www.oaic.gov.au/)

~~~
bilekas
I have an unexplainable urge to scream : "THE LIBERAL GOVERMENT!!!"

This is really cool news though, it's about time that Facebook take some
serious ownership of this mess.

------
aerovistae
yeah that's real likely

------
doublerabbit
Good.

~~~
rvz
Very good indeed.

Its a fine fit for a multi-billion dollar company. Unless they get it
significantly reduced somehow...

~~~
doublerabbit
Any fine against Facebook is good.

------
adtac
And when the actual fine is just $10bn, the markets will reward FB by
increasing their stock price.

~~~
vikramkr
Those aren't rewards. The price goes down at the opposite of the suit and the
fine gets priced in with a given risk factor, and if they end up doing better
than expected, then the price will adjust to integrate that new knowledge.
It's still lower than if they'd never gotten fined (though perhaps not lower
than if they hadn't unethically made that money in the first place)

------
jijji
sounds like excessive fines/bail violation of the 8th amendment lol

~~~
munk-a
How is this related to the 8th referendum[1]?

1\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1977_Australian_referendum](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1977_Australian_referendum)

------
akmarinov
Spoiler: they’ll get away with a couple of mil

------
r00fus
It's a good start to negotiations. Maybe they'll get $2B from FB. FB will
likely fund the current politicians' re-election campaigns in a quid-pro-quo
to drop/reduce charges.

Either way it's a good move on the part of governments to apply pressure to a
known shady actor.

~~~
simonh
Not all countries do politics the same way as the US.

