<story><title>Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE</title><url>https://www.npr.org/2019/04/05/710137783/motel-6-to-pay-12-million-after-improperly-giving-guest-lists-to-ice</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>nostromo</author><text>This is... strange.&lt;p&gt;When the federal government comes asking for your help, I think it&amp;#x27;s pretty normal for people to provide that help.&lt;p&gt;In a just world, if the government asks for something inappropriately, then the party at fault is the government.  (In other words, Washington should sue ICE, not Motel 6.)&lt;p&gt;If we want companies to require a subpoena to share information with the federal government (and personally &lt;i&gt;I do want that&lt;/i&gt;) then we should set that standard in law.  And we should enforce it fairly, not based on the hot political topic of the day.  (How much information does the CIA and FBI vacuum up from Washington telcos in a day in violation of this law, and why isn&amp;#x27;t anyone held to task?  Maybe because they have better lawyers than Motel 6.)&lt;p&gt;Helping the federal government do its job and then getting sued by the state seems like mom getting mad at you for doing what dad asked you to.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>code_duck</author><text>Isn’t it your duty to protect the privacy of your data and your customers regardless of who is requesting data? I thought companies like Twitter and Google routinely rebuffed requests for information from government agencies and opposed restrictive rules, e.g. in China, and are praised for it. The concept of resisting government requests for information is well established.&lt;p&gt;If the police called and asked for my customer list, I’d check whether they had that authority and many other issues before turning it over. I think we had an article on here earlier about ‘second order thinking’ that would cover that... getting an invasive request from the government, and fulfilling it regardless of consequences because you want to ‘help’ or consider them to be like Mom and Dad is first order thinking.&lt;p&gt;I’m no expert, but it seems increasingly common to have state laws that oppose or are stricter than federal laws, and you do have to be aware of all laws for your jurisdiction down to the county and city. Especially in any voluntary action, you have to consider whether it violates other laws or duties, and if they weren’t legally compelled to do this t was voluntary.</text></comment>
<story><title>Motel 6 to Pay $12M after Improperly Giving Guest Lists to ICE</title><url>https://www.npr.org/2019/04/05/710137783/motel-6-to-pay-12-million-after-improperly-giving-guest-lists-to-ice</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>nostromo</author><text>This is... strange.&lt;p&gt;When the federal government comes asking for your help, I think it&amp;#x27;s pretty normal for people to provide that help.&lt;p&gt;In a just world, if the government asks for something inappropriately, then the party at fault is the government.  (In other words, Washington should sue ICE, not Motel 6.)&lt;p&gt;If we want companies to require a subpoena to share information with the federal government (and personally &lt;i&gt;I do want that&lt;/i&gt;) then we should set that standard in law.  And we should enforce it fairly, not based on the hot political topic of the day.  (How much information does the CIA and FBI vacuum up from Washington telcos in a day in violation of this law, and why isn&amp;#x27;t anyone held to task?  Maybe because they have better lawyers than Motel 6.)&lt;p&gt;Helping the federal government do its job and then getting sued by the state seems like mom getting mad at you for doing what dad asked you to.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>js2</author><text>There&amp;#x27;s a Washington state consumer protection law. Some Motel 6 locations in the state broke that law by handing over data to Federal officials without a warrant.  The Federal officials broke no law in asking for the data without a warrant. It was the hotels which broke the law.&lt;p&gt;Maybe you could make an entrapment argument against the Federal officials. IANAL, so I don&amp;#x27;t know how that works. (I guess it&amp;#x27;s not entrapment because the Federal officials weren&amp;#x27;t trying to get Motel 6 to break the law for the purpose of going after Motel 6.)&lt;p&gt;And btw, since when has the law ever been enforced fairly, really?</text></comment>