If you've been working in the UK (or indeed any EU country) for the last month or so you've probably noticed a slew of emails reminding your company to get ready for then new General Data Protection Regulation, a.k.a. GDPR. Sadly, it seems some U.S. sites didn't get the memo.

SEE ALSO: How to use GDPR to clean out your inbox once and for all

On May 25th GDPR came into effect, implementing new laws about data protection within the European Union.

This is it.

Today, our EU #DataProtection rules enter into application, putting the Europeans back in control of their data.

Europe asserts its digital sovereignty and gets ready for the digital age.

Read our statement → https://t.co/P19IRPWfqv #GDPR pic.twitter.com/hwCKSj2TjE — European Commission 🇪🇺 (@EU_Commission) May 24, 2018

Multiple U.S. news sites like the Los Angeles Times, New York Daily News and Chicago Tribune are inaccessible for people in Europe.

Happy GDPR day. Let me just log on to read some new- pic.twitter.com/wgF5pq8FPE — Mark Di Stefano 🤙🏻 (@MarkDiStef) May 25, 2018

It looks like all Tronc newspapers like the LA Times and Chicago Tribune are GDPR non-compliant, so all traffic from Europe is hitting this wall pic.twitter.com/vTuy902DZv — Jon Passantino (@passantino) May 25, 2018

At time of writing Mashable tried to visit the websites from within the UK, and came across similar messages.

"Unfortunately, our website is currently unavailable in most European countries," read the LA Times website. "We are engaged on the issue and committed to looking at options that support our full range of digital offerings to the EU market. We continue to identify technical compliance solutions that will provide all readers with our award-winning journalism."

Image: los angeles times

Image: NY daily news

Image: chicago tribune

The BBC reported that the sites affected were owned by the Tronc and Lee Enterprises media publishing groups.

Also affected was USA Today, whose European site — although not entirely blocked — was very sparse compared to the usual U.S. version.

The "European Union Experience" is looking pretty bleak... Image: usa today

... especially when compared to its swanky American cousin! Image: usa today

Looks like GDPR has caught its first few big fish in its data-regulating net.

Although the mass-blocking is something of a nuisance, some online chose to see the funny side.

Scene from the Tronc GDPR compliance office pic.twitter.com/wBKSGDQDgc — GDPR compliant Mat Honan (@mat) May 25, 2018

Gosh, I thought it'd be annoying to be geoblocked from sites due to GDPR but everytime I come across one I just go "lol there'll be a competitor that can adhere to basic privacy guidelines for this in no time" — Rami Ismail (@tha_rami) May 25, 2018

GDPR tonight is what Y2K should have been. — Kevin Collier (@kevincollier) May 25, 2018

Hang on hang on hang on - what impact is GDPR going to have on Santa? — Ian Craig (@ArgusICraig) May 24, 2018

Mashable would have liked to have reached out to the affected news sites, but unfortunately we were blocked from doing so due to their sites being down. And you thought the chicken and the egg debacle was a tough paradox.