The sales office to data localization pipeline for mass surveillance.
Enter American culture-war nonsense.
In Texas, they want to ban websites that explain how to get an abortion, as well as sites that ship the pills for a medication abortion. In Florida, they want to force bloggers who write about the state government to pay a fee and register with the state, prohibiting anonymous commentary about the state legislature and its actions. Florida has also required that online providers cease permitting their users to display pronouns other than the ones they were assigned at birth. Of course, online services have no way to know what pronouns any of their users were assigned at birth, so sites like Github are complying with Florida law by simply not displaying pronouns to Floridian users.
The biggest barrier to enforcing these laws is the US Constitution, which these laws assuredly violate. It’s entirely possible that a lower court will uphold these laws. It’s conceivable that an appeals court will do so as well. It’s not outside the realm of possibility that the current Supreme Court — illegitimately stacked with far-right partisan hacks lacking any shred of principle — will follow suit.
But it’s far from a sure thing. It’s not even clear whether the legislatures that passed these laws and the governors who signed them want them to be enforced. After all, if these policies do come into force, large numbers of corporations are likely to shutter their offices and move out of state (especially in Florida, an increasingly economic irrelevance for any business not engaged in selling soon-to-be-drowned condos and/or shitcoins).
For these cynical political operators, having their laws overturned by “activist judges” lets them eat their cake and have it too — they don’t have to alienate the business lobby, and they get a steady supply of red meat for their cruel base, driving voter turnout and donations from frightened bigots.
-They’re still trying to ban cryptography