I view the privacy thing similar to how doxing is usually handled both legally and otherwise. If I put a sign outside of my house saying “so and so residence” then I’m doing under the assumption that it will be read by my neighbors or people driving down the street in front of my house. That doesn’t mean it then gives someone on a random internet forum based in another the right to say post a message in said forum saying what my last name and home address is. I didn’t consent to that by putting the sign outside my house and it’s still doxing regardless.
So just because a business owner shares their racial or ethnic background in one instance doesn’t mean they consent to it being shared in general, no matter the context. Obviously why they shared the information and under what circumstances they shared it under matter. If not legally, at least ethically. Although it’s still probably a legal issue.
They are by definition giving consent for it to be associated with the business. It is likely listed right on their store front or such. I do agree that any personal details shouldn’t be included with the business. That assumes the owners are not already including that information as part of thier business name somehow. For example, a medical practice advertising the fact that all of the doctors are from a particular nationality.
The problem with adding it to OpenStreetMap by way a unique tag is that’s it not associated with the business at that point since nothing stops anyone from just making a map based on ownership tags regardless of if they include the other tags associated with the business or if the map even has to do with businesses to begin with or not.
I think you really need to reword that in your posting, it is literally begging for outrage outside of OSM.
Nobody in this thread has objected to mapping minority-owned and women-owned businesses at all, the question is just about if that particular quality of the business should be recorded in the data or not.
This is meant only as an observation: shopping.google.com (in the US, at least) has click boxes on search results that allow you narrow your searches to various types of *-owned business:
As one arriving late to the discussion I see moderators strike again in favor of one political side.
1 Like
Mammi71
(One feature, Six mappers and still More ways to map it)
113
As someone who has read almost everything, I cannot share this view. Moderators are users just like you and me and are allowed to have their own opinion.
I see your point, but I also see how that it might be contested.
For example, in GDPR context, indeed if you share some of your personal data with one data processor for one purpose, it does not mean that this data processor may use that same data for some other purpose, nor that some other data processor may use that same data for any purpose (including the original one). In fact, it is strictly prohibited, and re-obtaining the consent is required for either. (but also note that obtaining the consent is not required for GDPR compliance in all cases; in fact, it is only one of 6 ways to lawfully process personal data - see Article 6 of GDPR).
When however you personally willfully publish your own personal information to the public (on your webpage, public facebook profile, door sign or wherever), the situation is perhaps not so clear:
I think most people will agree that if the owner themselves adds such personal POI details of their establishment to the OSM, that they are free and welcome to do so, according to ATYL.
But when one adds such information on establishments of other people, the answers to “is this legal?” and “did owner anticipate this and would like this?” might very well differ. In such a case, even if not required, it would be a gesture of goodwill to contact the owner and ask them if they would like that. If they answer “yes”, the problem is reduced to previous point and you should proceed to add it. If they however answer “please don’t”, then even if you perhaps had legal right, it would be polite not to do it.
TL;DR - IMHO, best results for everybody would be accomplished if mapper asks the owners if they are fine with publishing such information in OSM.
I appreciate you summarizing the British privacy law. It nice to know what it actually says. Looks like part #2 is definitely the most appropriate.
I believe the requirement to contact a business owner unenforceable especially in terms. At the end of the day there is no way to prove whether someone actually reached out.
I think it is more important that the same owners who public advertise thier affiliations often do so to get work with their local governments agencies.
Most of these agencies require that these businesses consent to have thier information in public documents in order to get preferred treatment. Governments are required to publish the names of businesses and reason why they have given them advantageously contracts. This is due to requirements in transparency laws. So most of these businesses have legally consented to have thier protected status in the public record.
I believe it would make sense to add information like italian-owned=yes to an Italian restaurant, to indicate it’s kind of authentic. Though it only makes sense on individual restaurants. Like adding american-owed=yes at a McDonalds is not much of an information. Same goes for any kind of ethnic group. What is the gain of information, that it’s owned by a Latino or Asian? Though I would be interested to know, the Chinese restaurant is actually run by a Chinese and not by a Japanese.
Same goes for <gender>-owned is the food better, because the owner is female? And even if so, how to validate this information?
McD’s are (often, usually, depends on region for exact contract law that guides) a “franchise” agreement where the corporate ownership of all of the intellectual property (IP) is retained by McD’s and the local rights to operate a restaurant is bought for a percentage of ongoing profits (after a “buy in” for the rights to franchise). That is a serious (over-)simplification. (Many decades ago, I was an employee).
So, the “restaurant IP” is owned by the corporation, the “right to operate under the corporate name in a local market” is part-owned (shared in a franchise contract signed by both parties) by a “local” operator.
Such subtle details don’t seem rightly entered into OSM. That’s my opinion.
I believe it’s the key is not giving that impression. sign=black-owned;woman-owned would be something describing, there is such a sign, where woman-owned=yes describes rather the fact that it is owned by a female. Verifying the existence of a sign is something completely different than checking, who is the owner.
So if the intention is to store existence of any kind of sign, the tagging scheme should represent it and OSM would also need to accept, mappers adding offensive/political/… signs.
Most businesses do not advertise their owner’s identity. Professional offices is obviously exception. In both situations the the owner’s protected status is on display the general public. There is no expectation of privacy.
Just ask the DWG, while not particularly frequent, now and then are complaints from businesses. And just last year locally we removed a business after a complaint, not the least because we are in a jurisdiction in which (for another 19 days) legal entities are provided privacy protections.
Historically we’ve taken the approach that we record anything in our data that is visible in real life, but in reality we know that that is not universal (just think about defence infrastructure).
and OSM would also need to accept, mappers adding offensive/political/… signs.