this post was submitted on 15 May 2025
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I still don't get where all this disinformation comes from. What do you mean by "the GDPR website"? Are you under the impression that the linked website is somehow official? Even so, the information seems solid and shouldn't give you these ideas.
no, the gdpr.eu website is not the official website of the EDPB, that's this one here.
the gdpr.eu website is maintained by the proton foundation, which is why it is, as you correctly recognized, a good resource for practical information about the GDPR.
"these ideas" boil down to "it always depends on the context".
that's exactly the point you keep missing: the GDPR cannot be generalized to make blanket statements like "usernames are always personal data" <--- this is a false statement.
and this is by design!
it's supposed to be contextual!
usernames are potentially, sometimes, even often personal data, but the law very specifically says that this is NOT always the case.
that's what the excerpt you quoted says: that these sorts of data are commonly considered personal data. whether or not something is personal data depends on the connected data.
with some, very limited, exceptions. for example: full names and addresses. those are actually always personal data.
the strange idea here is assuming that the GDPR allows anyone to make blanket statements without context.
also: STILL no explanation how anything in the article in any way relates to Fediverse services being somehow "illegal"?
how did you go from an article about "ad-tracking is illegal" to "the Fediverse is illegal"??
that's an Olympic level leap in mental gymnastics!
So, what you are telling me, is that you are an IT professional working in Europe, and in your considered opinion, emails don't fall under GDPR if you don't provide your phone number or something. And that totally doesn't sound like a joke. Is that about right?
so you think that an automated account like, say "[email protected]", is somehow personal data?
you forget that emails are constantly used by automated systems. those are, obviously, not personal data, because they can't identify a person.
and that's just the first example that comes to mind.
this is exactly why the answer to the question "do emails fall under the GDPR?" is "it depends."
"[email protected]" <-- most likely IS personal data.
"[email protected]" <-- almost certainly NOT personal data.
"email" as a concept does not automatically make it personal data.
it is only personal data, if it is connected to data that can reasonably be used to identify a natural person.
is the entire concept of nuance just lost on you??
some email addresses are personal data, other are not.
IT DEPENDS ON THE CONTEXT!!
this is the difference between a professional and a layman: a layman doesn't even know, how much they don't know.
No. I don't know why you would believe that.
why WOULD you believe that??
what natural person is identifiable by an automated message?
explain that.
Instead of being silly, why don't you just correct your disinformation and be done with it? Why these games?