Comment by Tyrubias
14 hours ago
I can’t imagine how any country would think the US is trustworthy enough to be the place where everyone stores their data. If companies cannot comply with data sovereignty laws then they shouldn’t exist at all. Personally, even as a US citizen, I’m hoping tech companies in Europe and Asia become independent enough to no longer be beholden to US interests. It’s clear that the era where any one country has global hegemony should end.
I do not trust anyone with my data. This is just my preference but every year I move further and further away from using the internet for anything other than making comments on this site and watching a few vloggers. In a few years I will not have more than 3 to 5 logins on anything and those will be value add and must be within driving distance. All critical services I use will require walking into a building in person.
If I could find a reputable construction company to build my underground home I would be a true troglodyte.
> If I could find a reputable construction company to build my underground home I would be a true troglodyte
If you have the resources you could always buy an existing underground structure and renovate. Like a missile silo. Or buy an already renovated one:
https://washingtonmissilebase.com/
I imagine upkeep is pretty expensive, probably needs a lot of HVAC, dehumidifying, pumping, etc to keep you from dying due to weird mold and stuff lol
I looked at many of those. Plenty of people are indeed upgrading silos. I looked at the cost to repair and overhaul these facilities but it would be just a little more to do it right on my property with high performance high pressure concrete and do it right in a place outside of the nuclear sponge. Only challenge is getting the right people up here but I will not give up on the idea.
> I do not trust anyone with my data.
Then why give it up in the first place? "Because you have to" is probably going to be the argument, but I don't buy that.
I'm glad you agree. It will take more than you or I to put a stop to this for people not yet on the internet but I will ask the US government to help.
Usually, when you want to have people not know who built what, you use an LLC.
THEN the LLC hires the subcontractors in stages without them knowing about each other.
Youd take about 5 years, but itd be about as secure as you could be if you lost trust in soceity.
It’s a trope in survivalist fiction. The contractors hired to build a bunker are often the first to attempt a breach once a crisis hits.
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It seems to me that major US cloud companies are using politics to try to get more value from non-US data, which I believe will push the EU (and others) to accelerate the move to their own alternatives. This is another move that seems to sacrifice longer-term trust (and profits) to boost near-term profits.
Depends how much compromising information they already have access to on the politicians concerned :-)
Please don't stop us having access to your information, else we will destroy you with the information we already hold :-)
I'm a US citizen and I hope more of the world decouples because I think a lot of our issues are due to a lack of competition.
Even as a US citizen ... I have started to decouple from US business that hold my data.
Same. I don't trust the US as much as the rest of the world does not trust them. They want control with little to offer for it. My data and compute is safer offshore at this time.
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where did you move your blog to? hetzner?
But we have our own issues outside of the US.
They reality is the average person is between a rock and a hard place.
Major US tech businesses are making money with analytics/ads though, so they would never roll out end-to-end encryption in a serious way. At least outside the US, a lot of E2E-encrypted services are popping up (Proton, Zeitkapsl, etc.).
I don't trust the small number of E2E US services at all. E.g., some of the companies that were/are in PRISM seem to have very convenient 'accidental' backdoors. E.g. WhatsApp doing backups on Google Drive without encryption by default on Android or Apple doing iCloud backups of iMessage that are not E2E encrypted unless you enable ADP. And even if you are wise enough to enable E2E in both cases, most people that you communicate with don't, because they use the defaults, so it's game over anyway.
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This. When I look at why my life sucks and is on hard difficulty mode, it's not because I use US tech instead of EU tech. Most people and companies have bigger economic challenges right now trying to keep the lights on, than data sovereignty and domestic alternatives. My company just had a 3rd round of layoffs and its wasn't due to lack of EU SW.
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> I think a lot of our issues are due to a lack of competition.
I think a lot of our issues are due to a lack of cooperation.
>Unipolar worlds are safer than Bipolar. Multipolar is extremely dangerous.
Do you want more people dead? I assume you didn't know how dangerous the world is without a hegemon..
The competition is China and the US is becoming so hysterical about it that I genuinely hope that the PLA is prepared for a nuclear first strike.
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I can’t imagine such a thing either, but here in Europe plenty of organisations continue planning on increasing their reliance and lock-in on American tech corps.
Which is perfectly fine (albeit perhaps stupid, I agree) for private enterprise. It's the public ones that need to shift first and foremost.
I mean the other options are China and Europe but honestly it's probably way safer as a EU/European citizen to have your data in the USA vs Europe.
The last thing I want is Europe in control of any of my data they just fundamentally don't think privacy from the government should exist. Pair that with the frankly appalling lack of free speech I wouldn't want to risk it.
You are free to put your data whereever you want. But from a national security perspective, it is critical that Europe can run vital, public services on software and infrastructure under their own control
Safer to have my data in the country that tries to manufacture a casus belli against my country than in my country? Safer to have my data in a country where I have no influence on what the legislature has to say on the handling of my data? Safer to have my data in a country with almost no privacy protection laws? Are we living in the same europe?
Such a missed opportunity. We could have been to data privacy and protection what Switzerland is to Banking.
But no, our cooperate oligarch overlords just can't keep their hands out of the piggy bank.
The swiss have a long tradition of discretion.
America has a long tradition of selling anything to the highest bidder. There was never any chance they were going to change.
Swiss? Where money laundering is basically a given?
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Didn't the US jail a guy for making a joke about Charlie Kirk? Didn't Don Lemon get arrested for protesting? How about the US government making it illegal to monitor ICE's activity?
As a Canadian, I can't think of anyone getting arrested for comments they made online, unless they are truly hate/violence/threats which would get anyone arrested in similar countries such as the US.
Just this week there was a white nationalist group protesting in Hamilton, and no one was arrested.
Europe is also not a country, it is a continent with many countries having different laws surrounding free speech.
> Europe...where they throw people in jail for social media posts? What do you think when they find out peoples' private convos?
When did this happen?
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp3wkzgpjxvo
https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/uk-court-jails-man-racist-tweets-s...
https://www.dw.com/en/germany-greens-habeck-presses-charges-...
https://reclaimthenet.org/germany-online-speech-raids-politi...
I'm sure you can find more; those were just the lowest hanging fruit in 2 minutes of searching.
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Germany – Robert Habeck insult raids (2024–2025): Multiple citizens faced police raids, investigations, fines, or suspended sentences (jail risk if violated) for online posts calling Green politician Robert Habeck derogatory names like "idiot" or "moron," or sharing mocking memes, under Section 188 enhancing penalties for insulting politicians. https://www.dw.com/en/germany-greens-habeck-presses-charges-...
Germany – Friedrich Merz "Pinocchio" case (2025–2026): A pensioner faced criminal investigation (potential fine or jail under Section 188) for a Facebook post calling Chancellor Friedrich Merz "Pinocchio," prosecuted as an insult likely to impair a politician's public duties. https://www.facebook.com/60minutes/posts/dozens-of-police-te...
Germany – Ricarda Lang insult investigation (2024–2025): A citizen was investigated (potential fine/jail) for an online post calling politician Ricarda Lang "fat," charged as criminal insult under Section 185 protecting officials from derogatory remarks. https://nypost.com/2025/02/21/world-news/germans-cant-insult...
There are UK examples too
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>China...where you cannot criticize the CCP?
I'd be more worried about the data being stolen and resold even faster than elsewhere tbh. staying out of the way of the ccp as a random guy on the other end of the world should be doable.
> Or the US where even the mainstream media can challenge the president?
The same US that was banning reporters from the press secretary's office (this isn't even new to Trump, Clinton also tried to pull the same shit back in the day)? The one where people were denied their entry visas because of memes of JD Vance? Where the white house has an official list of "Media Offenders"[0]?
Also we can't really ignore the US actively turning extremely hostile and talking about annexing territory belonging to its ex-allies when discussing things like this. That by itself makes the case pretty obvious for anyone, because why would you do business with a nation led by a sub-zero IQ petulant dementia patient that actively threatens annexation?
> Europe...where they throw people in jail for social media posts?
People in some EU Countries (Because "Europe" is a continent that encompasses many different countries with different laws and regulations, including EU and non-EU ones with very different laws and regulations. Denmark and Hungary could not be further from one another in pretty much every regard, for example) have been arrested for posts on social media, but who has actually been jailed for this? Where does this claim even come from, is it just a weird hope from USA-ians so they can portray "Europe" as some sort of free speech hell where you can't say anything without big brother knocking on the door?
To be abundantly clear I don't support people even getting arrested for the dumb shit they say online, but no one's going to prison because of this (that I'm aware of anyway).
Here in the Netherlands, the favorite pass time of most people was shitting on Rutte when he was PM, not to mention Geert and the absolute clown show that his cabinet was. The King and royal family in general gets shit all the time from every side of the political spectrum. Nobody has even been arrested here (as far as I know anyways, could be wrong) for that kind of speech. Notice how I'm not quivering in fear of talking shit about my government?
[0] https://www.whitehouse.gov/mediabias/
Also the Reporters Without Borders ranking:
https://rsf.org/en/index
US 57th place, the first non-European country is at position 16 (New Zealand).
> Or the US where even the mainstream media can challenge the president?
Can you name the last time this actually had an effect on a Republican-leaning president?
There's a reason the acronym TACO exists - every time Trump goes after the really deep money the backlash forces him to change his tune. If only the tariffs disproportionately affected the rich then we would have been done with them within a week - instead the most effected individuals and companies just got carve outs.
Can you explain what happened to Larry Bushart?
> I’m hoping tech companies in Europe and Asia become independent enough to no longer be beholden to US interests
What tech companies?
At the end of the day, it's all about capital and IP.
American domiciled VCs and companies can outinvest just about any other competitor, and much of the core IP for vast swathes of critical next-gen technologies (high NA EUV, Foundation Models, Quantum Computing) is in the US, but American companies are fine transferring technology abroad (often with American government backing [3][4]) and moving jobs abroad.
China has a similar ecosystem but prefers to invest domestically and for IP to remain within China.
Meanwhile Japan, Taiwan, and Korea continue to back the US no matter what due to tensions with China and North Korea along with existing fixed asset investments in the US.
When companies like Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft, and others are able to invest tens of billions of dollars in India [0], Poland [1], Israel [2], Portugal [5], Ireland [6], and others it makes them more open to collaborate with American capital and IP instead of dealing with alternatives who cannot deploy similar amounts of capital and transfer IP.
[0] - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-12-11/india-dra...
[1] - https://www.gov.pl/web/primeminister/google-invests-billions...
[2] - https://www.calcalistech.com/ctechnews/article/sjcwdmxxzg
[3] - https://www.state.gov/pax-silica
[4] - https://www.state.gov/releases/office-of-the-spokesperson/20...
[5] - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-11-11/microsoft...
[6] - https://www.irishtimes.com/business/2025/11/27/microsoft-has...
The world respected IP because the alternative was being tariffed. Now that we already are, the US can take it's IP laws and shove 'em for all I care.
Tariffs existed before a year ago, whether you knew about them or not.
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> What tech companies? At the end of the day, it's all about capital and IP.
It's not just about capital and IP. It's now about a halo of related things, like everyone using US payment networks - if the US unbanks you, even banks in your own country can't do business with you[1]. Or everyone using a US-based messaging platform (WhatsApp) because its been subsidised by a BigTech to cost $0, whereas text messages are still not free...
[1]: https://english.elpais.com/international/2025-12-28/the-comp...
>American domiciled VCs and companies can outinvest just about any other competitor,
Because every investor in the world put their money in the US. They knew the best companies and people would centralize around that hub.
When the US is a rogue, isolated idiocracy -- already true, but the world takes time to adapt to this new reality -- how much of that money do you think will flow to the US?
Much of the capital is US originated and domiciled.
American public pension funds alone hold $6 Trillion in AUM [0] and American endowment funds hold a little under $1 Trillion in AUM [1], and tend to be the LPs for most VC funds as most institutional investors follow the Yale Investment Model.
[0] - https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2025/2024-ann...
[1] - https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=73
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> When the US is a rogue, isolated idiocracy
This reads like wishful thinking from a butthurt European. I am not a fan of many of Trump's policies and I think ex-US investor sentiment has definitely soured. But it's not like the USA is now DPRK.
> how much of that money do you think will flow to the US?
If there's one thing you can be sure of about aggregate investor behavior, it's that investors seek good risk-adjusted returns regardless of any moral or political objections.
So long as capital flows remain unimpeded, property rights are respected, and US companies have good expected future returns, investors' money will continue to flow in to the US.
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"idiocracy" ... wow ... such a cool word! And so true.
Thank you.
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> What tech companies? At the end of the day, it's all about capital and IP.
it's a critical industry, so can be regulated to prevent foreign interference
airlines aren't granted freedom of the air unless they're domestically owned
and exactly the same approach can be applied to tech companies
Japan is a terrible example for you, they are focused on ditching the US.
>It’s clear that the era where any one country has global hegemony should end.
Unipolar worlds are safer than Bipolar. Multipolar is extremely dangerous.
I imagine you didn't know that more people will be killed if the US doesn't have hegemony.
Don't worry, China is coming out pretty far ahead so I'm sure we'll still be in a unipolar world when this is all over, and you can sleep safe at night. I imagine you didn't know.
You better be Han Chinese or you're cooked.
At least the US has the benefit of not really having a core ethnic class.
(To stem off the haters, the US has a "massive problem with racism" exactly because we have such a mixed society. Most monoracial places are obscenely and shamelessly racist, but never has a chance to arise)
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> Don't worry, China is coming out pretty far ahead so I'm sure we'll still be in a unipolar world when this is all over, and you can sleep safe at night. I imagine you didn't know.
With their current demographics? Doubt it.
I don't know man?
The Chinese are clearly doing some "rebalancing" lately. Some would even say that "rebalancing" is not a strong enough word. "De-linking" is a word a lot of those people are more comfortable with using to describe what we're seeing.
You can't really have a unipolar power if that power simply "takes all their marbles and goes home" so to speak.
I think we need to really do some strategic planning around scenarios where China or Europe simply withdraws from the rest of the world. Or decides they only need subsaharan Africa for instance.
Or, the nightmare scenario; where China, Europe, and subsaharan Africa actually figure out that together they don't really need anything from the rest of us.
assuming the hegemon is benevolent. if the hegemon isnt, you have nowhere to run. welcome to the labor camp, please leave your belongings here, the showers are to the right.
saying unipolar is better is like saying absolute monarchy is better. sure it is, as long as the good king is alive.
I don't care if they go sovereign, but the GDPR crap is annoying. Would be funny if the US just forced them to get rid of it.
If you're not in the EU, what even is the impact on you that was caused by GDPR? You're essentially not affected by it unless you run a business, which now you need to take greater care of the personal data you store. Is that what's annoying you or what?
The EU is to blame for cookie banners on basically every website on the internet.
I wish the US had something similar, and that there was more enforcement of disallowing "accept all" buttons without an equivalent "reject all" option. I also recognize that websites don't need the banner if they aren't trying to track me, but lets not pretend there aren't annoying consequences.
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You don't have to interact with GDPR if you don't use EU companies?
Not even that, if they aren't living in the EU the GDPR doesn't affect their lives in any way.
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