Kier Islamic Art Collection
Text
Advertencia de la UE a Meta - No puedes bloquear a la competencia de IA en WhatsApp
La Unión Europea ha lanzado una advertencia formal a Meta (matriz de Facebook e Instagram) tras detectar indicios de que la compañía está dificultando o bloqueando la integración de chatbots de inteligencia artificial de terceros dentro de WhatsApp. Según la Comisión Europea, esta práctica viola la Ley de Mercados Digitales (DMA), que exige que las grandes plataformas sean interoperables y no…
Advertencia de la UE a Meta - No puedes bloquear a la competencia de IA en WhatsApp
Text
O Regresso ao Armário (Digital)
A União Europeia, esse baluarte da firmeza moral, descobriu agora o charme irresistível de um “sussurro ao ouvido”. Teresa Ribera, na sua infinita sabedoria diplomática, acaba de elevar a regulação de monopólios ao nível de uma consulta de etiqueta em Downton Abbey.
Dantes, a União Europeia gostava de aplicar multas com o estrondo de uma guilhotina em praça pública. Agora? Agora o lema é a “discrição”. Pelos vistos, as regras da Lei dos Mercados Digitais (DMA) são como certas doenças de família: existem, incomodam, mas é de muito mau tom falar delas à mesa do jantar, especialmente se o tio Donald Trump estiver a ameaçar virar a mesa das tarifas.
Ribera explicou que os problemas se resolvem melhor “de forma muito discreta”. É uma abordagem refrescante. Imagino a cena: a Comissão Europeia deteta que a Google está a devorar a concorrência ao pequeno-almoço e, em vez de um processo judicial ruidoso, envia um cartão perfumado com um convite para um chá: “Querida Alphabet, importa-se de não ser tão imperialista? Ficava-lhe tão bem um pouco mais de interoperabilidade… jinhos, Bruxelas”.
Multas de “Bolso”: O Preço de um Café
As multas à Apple e à Meta têm sido “relativamente modestas”. Claro que sim. Aplicar uma multa de 500 milhões a empresas que faturam biliões é como tentar multar um pirata por ter um papagaio sem licença depois de ele ter saqueado as Caraíbas. Mas a Comissão insiste: não é medo do Washington de Trump; é apenas que as infrações foram “curtas”. Tão curtas que mal deu tempo para a Apple construir mais três ou quatro sedes monumentais com o lucro.
A melhor parte da crónica é, sem dúvida, a vontade de “ajudar a Google”. A UE quer explicar “mais pormenorizadamente” como é que a gigante deve partilhar dados. É quase comovente. É a regulação em modo Personal Trainer: “Vamos lá, Google, mais uma série de abertura de dados, tu consegues! Sente o burn da concorrência!”.
O Equilíbrio do Aço e do Algoritmo
No fundo, percebemos o drama. Howard Lutnick e a administração Trump já avisaram: ou a UE é “equilibrada” (tradução: cega, surda e muda) com as Big Tech, ou o aço europeu vai pagar a fatura com tarifas de 50%. E nada diz mais “concorrência livre” do que decidir o futuro digital com uma arma de aço e alumínio apontada à têmpora.
A Europa continua a ser um “guardião” dos mercados, mas agora é um guardião que usa pantufas de veludo para não acordar os gigantes americanos. Afinal, como diz Ribera, a discrição beneficia todos. Especialmente aqueles que preferem que a justiça se faça em salas privadas, longe dos olhares indiscretos de quem ainda acredita que a lei é igual para todos — independentemente do tamanho do servidor ou do mau feitio do Presidente.
Text
ما الفرق بين الآي-فون الأمريكي والأوروبي
تتربع شركة آبل على عرش التكنولوجيا كعلامة تجارية عالمية، حيث تصدر أجهزتها المتطورة للمستهلكين في شتى بقاع الأرض. ورغم هيمنتها على صناعة الهواتف الذكية، فإن شعار “صُمم في كاليفورنيا” لا يعني بالضرورة أن جميع هواتف الآي-فون متطابقة في كل مكان. عند المقارنة بين النسخ الأمريكية وتلك الموجهة للاتحاد الأوروبي، نجد اختلافات جذرية تتجاوز مجرد الشكل الخارجي، لتشمل العتاد الداخلي، ودعم شرائح الاتصال، وحتى…
Text
Apple accuses EU Commission of ‘political delay tactics’ amid App Store policy disputes
In a sharp escalation of its ongoing regulatory battles, Apple has accused the European Commission (EC) of employing “political delay tactics” to stall the implementation of new app policies, allegedly as a means to launch investigations and impose fines on the tech giant, according to Bloomberg News’ Mark Gurman.
The accusation comes in response to emerging reports that the EC is poised to blame…
Text
Une prison dorée .. qui commence à se corroder
Comme dit dans mon précédent billet, il est parfois temps d'ouvrir les yeux et de constater quand des choses pourrait être améliorées et ouvrir le champ des possibles, qu'un bridage artificiel et dont le seul argument est un sentiment de sécurité lié à la vie privée.
Le problème, c'est que ces blocages matériels et logiciels n'ont parfois pas lieux d'être et le seul intérêt est financier.
Je ne suis pas un fervent partisan d'Apple bien qu'en étant un utilisateur de longue date,
Je ne suis pas un partisan de l'Europe ou de l'UE, bien qu'étant né dedans et y habitant,
Force est de constater que de temps à autre, une société, un organisme, un groupe pour qui nous n'avons pas d'affinité sociale/politique à longueur d'année et qui représente peut-être l'opposé de nos idées politiques sur plusieurs domaines la plupart du temps peux parfois amener des idées utiles qui relèvent simplement .. du bon sens.
Ce qui relève du bon sens également est ne pas s'enfermer intégralement dans un écosystème et y être dépendant et TOUJOURS avoir le choix.
J'approuve cette décision de l'Union européenne,
Dans la mesure ou Apple ne fait plus de produits ni logiciels de qualité supérieure, encore moins de services en ligne irréprochables et ce depuis un certain moment.
Le SAV est inefficace pour régler des soucis de nature logicielle, matérielle, et qui ont une atteinte directe sur le quotidien me concernant.
Pouvoir changer d'écosystème quand celui-ci nous pourrit la vie et qu'aucune solution n'existe est une étape qui doit être franchissable par tout utilisateur.
Je salue cette décision de pouvoir transférer facilement nos données, qui nous appartiennent.
> https://www.numerama.com/tech/2147935-ios-26-3-leurope-va-forcer-a-apple-a-faire-un-nouveau-changement-sur-iphone.html
Apple se targue d'être le défenseur des données personnelles et de la vie privée, qu'il nous laisse les transférer vers d'autres appareils selon nos choix consentis et éclairés.
Nous ne sommes pas des enfants et n'avons pas besoin de tutelle.
Text
Trump admin warns EU over harassing lawsuits, taxes, fines, and directives against U.S. companies
President Donald Trump holds a signed executive order on tariffs, in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, D.C., April 2, 2025.
In a sharply worded statement posted on X, the Trump administration via its Office of the United States Trade Representative has accused the European Union and its member states of engaging in a prolonged pattern of discriminatory practices against American…
Text
App developers call for EU action on Apple’s App Store fees
A coalition of 20 app developers and consumer groups urged European regulators on Tuesday to strictly enforce EU laws against Apple, arguing that the company’s App Store fee structure continues to put European developers at a competitive disadvantage relative to their U.S. counterparts following a recent U.S. court ruling in the Epic Games antitrust case.
The group, part of the Coalition for Apps…
Text
The Global Electronics Association Launches Double Materiality Assessment Toolkit
Global Electronics Association has launched a new Double Materiality Assessment (DMA) Toolkit designed to help electronics industry players navigate the stringent sustainability reporting requirements of the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), enabling quicker, more accurate assessments of how environmental and social issues impact both the planet and corporate finances.
Text
The next (and last) piece in my Spies are Forever poster set, obviously I love the Torture Tango
[[MORE]]And for those curious, my #1 song from the Spies are Forever soundtrack is, of course, One Step Ahead
Text
Game Space is hosting the Pixels & PItfalls event, discussing failure in the games sector on Octover 22nd in Abertay’s CyberQuarter
Game Space Talks Games Industry Failure with Firestoke Founder
Text
The first of MANY Dedicated Moot Awards (DMA) goes to:
@quietrainflower !!!
I drew Honey! Sorry if I got her size wrong because she could be the tiniest thing ever or absolutely gargantuan
I drew Honey interacting with my tadc oc Lucky by the way
I do love her though/silly
Text
Apple threatens to stop selling iPhones in the EU
ALTIf you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2025/09/26/empty-threats/#500-million-affluent-consumers
Apple has threatened to stop selling iPhones and other devices in the European Union (home to over 500,000,000 affluent consumers) if the bloc doesn’t rescind the Digital Markets Act, a democratically accountable anti-monopoly law that bans Apple from blocking third parties from offering services to iPhone owners:
Apple has a staunch ally in this campaign to overturn European laws: Donald Trump has threatened the EU with tariffs unless it halts its attempts to regulate US tech giants like Apple, whose billionaire CEO Tim Cook gave Donald Trump $1m in exchange for a seat on the dais at Trump’s inauguration and then traveled to DC again to hand-assemble a gilded participation trophy as a gift to America’s fascist would-be dictator:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/08/07/tim-cook-trump-gift/85555805007/
This is a painfully stupid threat and the EU should call Apple’s bluff. The company claims that it is acting in the interest of European owners of Apple products. Apple claims that by blocking Europeans from using their Apple devices with third-party software and hardware, they are protecting their customers’ privacy.
This is nonsense. While it’s true that Apple protects its customers’ privacy from some external threats, Apple also spies on its users, without their consent, in order to gather behavioral data that’s used for Apple’s ad-targeting system. When this came to light, Apple lied to its customers about it:
https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/14/luxury-surveillance/#liar-liar
Apple has used its exclusive control over which software can operate on its devices to expose every Chinese iOS user to unrestricted government surveillance. Apple removed all working VPNs from its Chinese app store:
https://www.cnet.com/news/apple-removes-vpn-apps-from-china-app-store/
The company then backdoored its iCloud backup for unrestricted access by Chinese authorities:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/17/technology/apple-china-censorship-data.html
Then they removed the ability to anonymously share messages via Airdrop to curb the tool’s usage to spread opposition messages during a wave of mass protests in China (they took away this functionality for every Airdrop user in the world):
The idea that Apple is so committed to its users’ privacy that it will exit a major market rather than expose users to surveillance risks is an obvious lie – just ask China.
Why would Apple tell this lie? Because it wants to protect its profits – not its customers.
Apple lies when it claims that control over its platforms is primarily about protecting users. The App Store is “teeming with scams”:
However, by forcing Apple customers to get apps from Apple’s own store, the company can skim a 30% commission on every dollar its customers send to an app maker, a Patreon performer, a news outlet or any other app supplier – a business that’s worth $100b/year to Apple. Remember, in the EU, the cost of processing a payment is between 0% and 1%.
Apple claims that it protects its customers from privacy risks by blocking third-party repair depots and by requiring its customers to pay through the nose for official repair. But Apple’s own repair technicians have been caught plundering and sharing nude images of its own customers, stolen from phones that were sent to Apple:
This has happened repeatedly:
All over the world:
https://9to5mac.com/2016/10/12/apple-australia-photo-sharing-ring-nsfw/
(And of course, these are just the instances that we know about).
Apple protects its customers from privacy threats, but not from Apple’s own predatory, privacy-invasive, rent-extracting conduct. Apple also gets to unilaterally decide which scams are permitted on its platform and which ones are not, and they alone get to decide when to allow secret, pervasive surveillance of Apple customers.
[[MORE]]Apple’s threats are lies, but the privacy risks of interop are very real. It’s entirely possible to plug something into a secure tool that renders it insecure. It’s nice when companies test third party add-ons and warn their customers about defective or risky aftermarket mods, and to the extent that Apple does this, it’s doing good work. But Apple has an irreconcilable conflict of interest when it comes to vetoing its customers’ decisions about which non-Apple products they use. Apple has some genuinely stonking margins on its payment processing, repair, and other lines of business, and Apple’s CEO has openly boasted about using deliberately engineered incompatibilities to drive people to switch to Apple products:
https://www.businessinsider.com/tim-cook-buy-your-mom-iphone-doj-apple-complaint-2024-3
How do we get Apple to protect its customers’ privacy without picking their pockets or invading their privacy? By removing the company’s veto over who can make software and hardware that works with Apple’s competing offerings. The ultimate decision about which products are too dangerous for Europeans to use can’t be vested with Apple – instead, it should be vested with expert agencies working for democratically accountable governments. This is the point that Bennett Ciphers and I made at length in our EFF white-paper “Privacy Without Monopoly,” which has a whole section explaining how the EU’s big, muscular privacy law, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), makes this an especially attractive proposition in the EU:
https://www.eff.org/document/privacy-without-monopoly-data-protection-and-interoperability
It’s also a point that EFF board member and infosec legend Bruce Schneier made in his open letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee, discussing opening up app stores:
https://www.eff.org/document/letter-bruce-schneier-senate-judiciary-regarding-app-store-security
Apple isn’t going to exit a market with half a billion affluent consumers. If it does, expect its shareholders to wreak swift and terrible vengeance on the company. You know how people are always complaining that investors are only interested in short-term returns? It’s true and here’s a place where that cuts in our favor: shareholders aren’t going to accept a half-billion-person market exit tomorrow in anticipation of forcing the EU to capitulate next year and thereafter safeguard Apple’s continental scale rent-extraction racket. They want returns to their capital tomorrow, not in some hypothetical future in which Tim Cook tears out Henna Virkkunen’s still-beating heart with his bare hands and parades it through Strasbourg, brandishing it at legions of trembling, vanquished eurocrats.
But let’s say Apple does exit the EU.
Good.
The EU needs to get the hell off US tech infrastructure. Under Trump, Big Tech and the US government have stopped even pretending that American tech companies are independent of the US government. We know (from China) that Apple will happily backdoor its cloud servers to assuage authoritarian governments like Xi Xinping’s. You know, Xi Xinping, the guy that Trump says he wants to emulate?
https://www.politico.com/news/2023/12/18/trump-praise-authoritarians-00132350
US Big Tech companies keep demonstrating that they are de facto arms of the US and constitute a hostile foreign power operating on European soil. When the International Criminal Court indicted Israeli génocidaires, Trump issued an executive order sanctioning the body. Immediately thereafter, Microsoft deleted the email and cloud accounts of ICC prosecutor Karim Khan – named in the Trump EO – and then Microsoft President Brad Smith perjured himself in his denial:
Microsoft publicly admitted that it can’t stop US authorities from conducting secret surveillance of EU citizens’ (and EU governments’) data, even when that data is stored on server in the EU:
The EU’s response is something called “Eurostack” – a top-to-bottom “stack” of technologies from data-centers to operating systems and applications made and maintained by EU entities (for-profits, nonprofits, and public bodies):
https://pluralistic.net/2025/06/25/eurostack/#viktor-orbans-isp
Nearly all of the emphasis on Eurostack has been on building the data-centers and creating these applications, but some ways, this is the least important part of the project. Cloning GDocs or Office365 or iWork is the easy part. The hard part is migrating from US-controlled platforms to their Eurostack equivalents. If leaving Office365 means leaving all the documents your company, organization or government agency has ever created, or losing all the sharing and collaboration permissions, or losing all the edit-histories, well, no one is gonna migrate.
Thankfully, this is something technology can easily fix: all you need to do is reverse-engineer the US offering and create a tool that extracts and transforms the data to the new format, and moves a copy of it into the new Eurostack services. This is called “adversarial interoperability” and is eminently do-able, as Apple proved when they broke open Microsoft Office by creating the iWork suite (Pages, Numbers and Keynote):
The major impediment to this kind of seamless bulk migration tool isn’t the technological challenge – it’s the law. In 2001, the EU – under pressure from the USA – included an “anticircumvention” rule in the EU Copyright Directive (EUCD). Article 6 of the EUCD mirrors the language of Section 1201 of America’s Digital Millennium Copyright Act, banning reverse-engineering and adversarial interoperability, even where no copyright infringement takes place. That means that a European company that made an account migration tool to help European companies or government agencies move their own data out of a US Big Tech silo could face liability under Article 6 of the EUCD, with severe criminal and civil penalties. EUCD 6 gives American tech giants more rights to Europeans’ copyrighted works than the Europeans who created those works. It’s a terrible law, and after a quarter century, it’s long past its expiry date.
Bringing this full circle: Article 6 of the EUCD is also the law that stops European companies from reverse-engineering the iPhone and creating their own app stores, without having to rely on Apple’s help. Given that Apple has flagrantly violated laws that order it to open its app store, it’s time to unleash Europe’s accomplished legion of top technologists on the problem:
https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/06/spoil-the-bunch/#dma
Doing that becomes even easier if Apple exits the EU and abandons EU customers, cutting off their supply of security patches and application updates. After all, Europeans own their Apple devices. It’s up to them – not Apple – whether they want to trust their fellow Europeans to protect their security and add new functionality of their own property.
The EU doesn’t need to be a technology-taker – it can be a technology maker. The Apple/Google duopoly may have sewn up the mobile market with illegal monopoly tactics, but that doesn’t mean that the EU will never spawn another Nokia or Ericsson. The shortest, most efficient, most reliable path to reestablishing technological sovereignty for the EU’s half-billion residents and 27 member-states is to allow domestic firms to take over the relationship between the Trump-controlled American tech giants and the Europeans who rely on their technology.
If Trump can seize Chinese companies like Tiktok and sell them to his major donors at a 90% discount, then American companies have no right to cry foul when the EU gets rid of the America First Copyright Directive and lets Europeans choose to get their software, updates, and hardware from European companies.
Image:
Alex Popovkin, Bahia, Brazil from Brazil (modified)
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Annelid_worm,_Atlantic_forest,_northern_littoral_of_Bahia,_Brazil_%2816107326533%29.jpg
CC BY 2.0
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en
–
Hubertl (modified)
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:2015-03-04_Elstar_%28apple%29_starting_putrefying_IMG_9761_bis_9772.jpg
CC BY-SA 4.0
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en
Text
Alerta en la UE - La nueva ley que está convirtiendo a iOS en Android
Apple emitió una polémica declaración afirmando que la Ley de Mercados Digitales (DMA) de la Unión Europea está forzando a iOS a abrirse, pareciéndose cada vez más a Android. La compañía tecnológica asegura que estas regulaciones están retrasando y podrían cancelar nuevas funciones exclusivas en la región debido a graves problemas de privacidad y seguridad para sus usuarios (Fuente Apple).
La…
Alerta en la UE - La nueva ley que está convirtiendo a iOS en Android
Text
🏨 Oltre 10.000 hotel europei pronti alla class action: accusano Booking.com di aver imposto clausole ingiuste per anni. È una lotta per la concorrenza, il diritto a vendere e il futuro dell’ospitalità europea.
#BookingCom, #classaction, #hotels, #ospitalità, #DMA, #concorrerenza, #hotrec, #digitalmarket, #turismo, #FairTrade
Albergatori europei pronti a class action contro Booking.com
Text
Teknoloji Devlerine Getirilen Yeni Düzenlemeler
Avrupa Birliği’nin Dijital Piyasalar Yasası (DMA) kapsamında hayata geçirdiği düzenlemeler, dijital piyasalarda rekabetin artırılması ve kullanıcılar…
Text
Teknoloji Devlerine Getirilen Yeni Düzenlemeler
Avrupa Birliği’nin Dijital Piyasalar Yasası (DMA) kapsamında hayata geçirdiği düzenlemeler, dijital piyasalarda rekabetin artırılması ve kullanıcılar…