German Of The Day: Nervenzusammenbruch

That means nervous breakdown. Having them is a favorite German pastime. These days especially.

Germans on the verge of a nervous breakdown – It’s a sign of the nation’s fraught state of mind that many seriously believe this week’s unlikely plotters could have toppled democracy.

Early Wednesday, thousands of balaclava-clad German police officers fanned out across the country, arresting 25 people and seizing weapons to upend what authorities described as a diabolical plot to overthrow the country’s government and reinstate the monarchy. The group’s “military arm” was surreptitiously building “a new German army,” the lead prosecutor on the case said.

A day later, however, the case looks more like the script of a Monty Python episode than a sequel to the Day of the Jackal…

Al Qaeda it was not.

Electric Cars Emitting Too Much CO2 In Germany

And spying on Germans. Or something.

Tesla Hit by German Suit Over Car Surveillance, Carbon Footprint – German Consumer Group VZBV files action in Berlin court. Case argues drives using device may violate data rules

Tesla Inc. was hit by a lawsuit in Germany over potential privacy concerns linked to its car surveillance cameras and claims that buying its vehicles helps cut CO2 emissions.

My Car Is Spying On Me

No, that’s not from a Philip K. Dick novel.

It’s bitter reality. In German minds, anyway.

Tesla cars have been banned by police in the German capital Berlin over spying fears sparked by the vehicles’ high-tech cameras.

The ban comes just a day after China banned all Teslas from a resort town where the country’s secretive leadership group is holding a conference.

Germans Want Faces Back

They want to save face. No, that’s precisely what they do not want. They don’t want their faces saved. Only if they are in a save place. I mean safe, of course.

Let’s face it. If you take what they say at face value, this means they don’t want companies like Clearview AI all up in their face. And they’re not joking either. They’re demanding that they get their faces back with a straight face.

How I Lost Control Over My Own Face – A company called Clearview AI secretly scrapes the internet for photos, thus producing a gigantic database for government agencies and police. Is it possible to remove yourself from the collection?

“Fascist” Just Doesn’t Work Anymore

I know. Why don’t we give “QAnon” a try?

QAnon

It is, after all, “the most dangerous cult of our times.”

Traditionally weak in the argument department, those of the leftist fringe normally call those who don’t agree with them “racists,” “Nazis,” “bigots” or “Fascists,” to name a few, but now their marketing department has discovered that these insults just don’t have the customer appeal they once enjoyed. This is they have now introduced a new product: “QAnon.” Guaranteed to to bludgeon thought criminals into line every time. At least until the next product comes along.

QAnon’s Inexorable Spread Beyond the U.S. – The bizarre, pro-Trump cult known as QAnon has been gaining followers in the United States for months. Now, the conspiracy theory has begun spreading to Germany. It’s followers believe that the coronavirus is a weapon of the elite in their quest to enslave the world.

It’s Called Paranoia

Why is Germany a blank spot on Google’s Street View? See above.

Paranoia

There are good historical reasons why Germans are suspicious of surveillance — but is Google as bad as Gestapo or Stasi?

It’s to do with Germans’ curious sense of privacy: they’d rather flaunt their private parts than their personal data…

While public nudity is a big no-no in the United States for example, Germany has a long tradition with what is known as FKK – short for Freikörperkultur, or “Free Body Culture.” Certain beaches and areas of city parks are dedicated to nude sunbathing, and even Nacktwanderung (“nude rambling”) is a thing.

On the other hand, Germans are extremely possessive of their personal data — and are shocked by the readiness with which Americans (and others) share their names, addresses, friends’ lists, and purchase histories online.

According to research presented in the Harvard Business Review, the average German is willing to pay as much as $184 to protect their personal health data. For the average Brit, the privacy of that information is only worth $59. For Americans and Chinese, that value declines to single-digit figures.

Whatever Is Not Expressly Allowed

Is verboten. In Germany. If you’re Facebook, Google, Amazon, WhatsApp, Instagram, Twitter and Co., that is.

Facebook

Recognize a pattern here? They’re all American companies and they’re all “free” to use. The Germans, of all people, surely must have figured out by now that nothing is ever for free. But they haven’t.

GERMAN REGULATORS JUST OUTLAWED FACEBOOK’S WHOLE AD BUSINESS – FACEBOOK’S MASSIVELY LUCRATIVE advertising model relies on tracking its one billion users—as well as the billions on WhatsApp and Instagram—across the web and smartphone apps, collecting data on which sites and apps they visit, where they shop, what they like, and combining all that information into comprehensive user profiles. Facebook has maintained that collecting all this data allows the company to serve ads that are more relevant to users’ interests. Privacy advocates have argued that the company isn’t transparent enough about what data it has and what it does with it. As a result, most people don’t understand the massive trade-off they are making with their information when they sign up for the “free” site.

“We disagree with their conclusions and intend to appeal so that people in Germany continue to benefit fully from all our services.”

European Data Security Just Got More Secure

So secure that not even your mailman, friends or family will be able to find you anymore.

Datenschutz

Europeans want secure data. So you can imagine how thrilled everybody is about this latest development.

The city of Vienna has determined that name tags in apartment houses are a violation of the EU’s GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation). After a renter complained about the lack of proper data security, some 220,000 renters will lose the name tags next to their doorbells.

In Wien verlieren etwa 220.000 Mieterinnen und Mieter die Namensschilder an ihren Türklingeln, weil ein Bewohner sich über mangelnden Datenschutz beklagt hatte.

US-Amerikan Gas Conspiracy In Full Swing

German survey time – and no Russian influence here, either. Honest: BASF-owned Wintershall, one of Gazprom’s closest upstream partners and backer of its Nord Stream 2 project, has published results of a survey which it says indicate that most Germans not only oppose an expansion of US sanctions against Russia but also prefer Russian gas to US LNG.

LNG

More than three-quarters (77 percent) believe that the US is attempting to bolster its own economic interests in the European natural gas market… The survey also showed that the vast majority of Germans (83 percent) reject the planned increase in US economic sanctions, which would also restrict the actives of German and European companies. Only seven percent considered criticism of planned US sanctions as exaggerated.

“Whereas half the Germans surveyed support a further diversification of the natural gas provision, only six percent want more imports of US LNG,”

Russia Feels Germany’s Puzzlement

Speaking at an event in Berlin’s Hotel Adlon, Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov could not agree more with German concern for the growing anti-Russian sentiment in Europe and around the world, explaining to understanding listeners that it is all just another anti-Russian conspiracy orchestrated by Washington, the UN, the EU, NATO,  the International Association of Youth Hypnotists, the Society for the Prevention of Plate Tectonics, the Animal Voting Rights Defense League and many, many, many others.

Russia

“Russia bashing these days is just as much a mystery to me as it is to you Germans,” Lavrov said. “Our annexation of the Crimea has long been forgotten, as have our countless bloody covert operations in Ukraine and the open bullying of our Baltic neighbors that is still going on. Our ongoing atrocities in Syria are second page news. And who cares anymore about our relentless and highly sophisticated hacker attacks all over the world, the ones we never committed, I mean? Nor is Germany’s dependence upon Russian gas of any concern to anyone, much less you here in Germany. It’s not like it would ever be used to exert political influence or anything. Then there is this recurring myth about our treatment of the political opposition in Russia. Ridiculous. There is no political opposition in Russia. I could go on and on forever but what’s the point? Like I said, this Russia phobia wackiness sure the hell beats me.”

Lawrow beklagt Russophobie in EU und Nato.