Biden’s TikTok ultimatum: Sever ties with China or face US ban

China says there's no evidence that TikTok threatens US national security.

See full article...

 

[Atterus]

No doubt about it, the CCP has done orders of magnitude more evil within China. But Twitter and Facebook are the ones spreading fascism in the US. I get the potential harms of TikTok so I would support a ban, but I think this discussion is taking away from the actual demonstrated harms of our own home grown social networks.

Low hanging fruit. We are so focused on "getting 100%" anymore we have let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Infinitely easier to ban a forigen intelligence op over a domestic company doing stuff there are no laws against. One is using data for blatant military purposes, the other is trying to make a buck selling marketing research... one is a dire emergency, the other is frankly not.

It would very much be in line with historic CCP tactics to try and bog down the ban by making this about a very complex social issue instead of their malicious behavior. They tried doing that when Huawei got canned. We need to quit giving these bad actors the time they need to shore up the damage and remind the likes of Xi he has zero authority here, however much he thinks otherwise. They literally fly spy ops and demand we return their property because they think they had a right to our airspace...

Pop him in the nose for a change, same with Putin, they'll be reeling for years that someone actually struck back for a change. Chamberlain is not a good role model here...

 

[timber]

Just to be clear, Google and Facebook weren't banned. China came out with laws on content and data, and these companies refused to comply and chose to close their business.

Microsoft, on the other hand, chose to comply and Bing is available in China.

The thing is, TikTok isn't actually breaking any US laws. Their only crime right now is being Chinese. Unlike the US, China didn't threaten to ban Google unless they sell their Chinese business to Baidu.

So they are smart at banning foreign companies. Others should learn.

 

[mephits]

Well, if you want proof Tik Tok violates privacy, here you go:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/emilybaker-white/2022/12/22/tiktok-tracks-forbes-journalists-bytedance/
NPR's podcast "Make Me Smart" yesterday had an interview with Emily Baker-White, the Forbes reporter Tik Tok stalked. Her take on the incident was interesting.

 

[Somiac]

Oh, it'll switch right over to Instagram Reels and Youtube Shorts.

Oh I know, thats why I said a couple of hours.

 

[shelbystripes]

Okay, so what about all the other Chinese apps, such as various games that are super popular? Make the ban apply to all foreign-owned apps that are on phones then.

This is the direction we’re headed, and it’s going to lead to Balkanization of the Internet.

I’m not even going to get into whether that’s a good or bad thing, just saying that’s where we’re headed with this. Blocking foreign governments from monitoring domestic citizens is literally only possible by blocking entire categories of international data transfers.

 

[A.Felix]

I think the most likely national security threat is in more subversive ways that the general public would ever be aware of.

All it takes is for China to force TikTok to add some zero day into the app, and use that to collect all kinds of intelligence. They would probably never use the app to blow up everyones phones a-la Kingsman, but instead run an ongoing intel operation.

There's also the collection of aggregate data similar to Facebook, except they can use it in very illegal ways that you will have no control over. Use collected TikTok data to generate deepfakes of civil unrest in US cities, sowing division in the population. Seed those videos into everyone's feed, and you've got a mass propoganda machine in everyone's pocket.

Further, if (or when, really) one of these kids grows up to be an intelligence agent, China would have all the blackmail they need to compromise that agent.

You don't need evidence of these scenarios to predict it will happen... you just need this data the hands of an adversary.

You know what the real scary part of all this scenario is? Nothing about it requires TikTok. You don't need deepfakes about civil unrest. The point of a deepfake is to impersonate someone publicly known. If you just want to serve videos of civil unrest, you don't even need deepfakes. In fact, deepfakes would be counterproductive because the person you're faking can go on Twitter or something to say that's not them. If you have a bunch of randos you either hired or generated, who's going to call you on your bullshit?

Now, as for seeding the videos, you also don't need TikTok. Facebook and Twitter will serve all the disinformation you want if you generate engagement. So all you need is to post those videos, and get one of your Chinese troll farms to start liking, commenting, sharing, and reposting. Your content will rise to the top because it's engaging, and it's generating money, and that's the only thing that matters in the US. Once there, it'll gather a following. Some people will correctly say "this isn't happening, this is bullshit" but as we know by now, that doesn't matter. You can have people gather for the resurrection of JFK to lead them to victory.

The propaganda machine in your pocket is already there, and it's already been used by foreign entities. Maybe you can get more out of it if you own it, I'll agree with that, but at least for your scenario, there's nothing that it needs that isn't doable without TikTok, or worse, that hasn't been already done before. People even died during the pandemic based on shit like that, for the sole purpose of generating a political divide, and money for certain groups peddling false treatments. They'll literally go down the rabbit hole of disinformation even if it cost them their lives, and those around the dead will still continue to do so even if they literally just witnessed it cost the life of a loved one.

 

[Yarrum]

That's almost universally true for every citizen of every country, and therefore every app that collects data. Yet we're not talking about banning every foreign-with-an-unsavory-government app.

As a Brit is funny to see the US complain about TikTok having to hand over data if China asks for it, but a few years back the US was happy to pass the CLOUD Act allowing US law enforcement to force US companies to hand over data even if it is hosted outside the US or held by a non-US part of the company. (The act stemmed from the FBI being unhappy Microsoft US wouldn't handover data being stored by Microsoft Ireland in the EU).

 

[shelbystripes]

There's also the collection of aggregate data similar to Facebook, except they can use it in very illegal ways that you will have no control over.

“except that”?

I guess by “you” you meant “the United States government”.

 

[shelbystripes]

You know what the real scary part of all this scenario is? Nothing about it requires TikTok. You don't need deepfakes about civil unrest. The point of a deepfake is to impersonate someone publicly known. If you just want to serve videos of civil unrest, you don't even need deepfakes. In fact, deepfakes would be counterproductive because the person you're faking can go on Twitter or something to say that's not them. If you have a bunch of randos you either hired or generated, who's going to call you on your bullshit?

Now, as for seeding the videos, you also don't need TikTok. Facebook and Twitter will serve all the disinformation you want if you generate engagement. So all you need is to post those videos, and get one of your Chinese troll farms to start liking, commenting, sharing, and reposting. Your content will rise to the top because it's engaging, and it's generating money, and that's the only thing that matters in the US. Once there, it'll gather a following. Some people will correctly say "this isn't happening, this is bullshit" but as we know by now, that doesn't matter. You can have people gather for the resurrection of JFK to lead them to victory.

The propaganda machine in your pocket is already there, and it's already been used by foreign entities. Maybe you can get more out of it if you own it, I'll agree with that, but at least for your scenario, there's nothing that it needs that isn't doable without TikTok, or worse, that hasn't been already done before. People even died during the pandemic based on shit like that, for the sole purpose of generating a political divide, and money for certain groups peddling false treatments. They'll literally go down the rabbit hole of disinformation even if it cost them their lives, and those around the dead will still continue to do so even if they literally just witnessed it cost the life of a loved one.

We know for a fact that this has been happening since at least 2016, and without foreign countries owning or controlling any of the social media platforms Americans use.

 

[watermeloncup]

Low hanging fruit. We are so focused on "getting 100%" anymore we have let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Infinitely easier to ban a forigen intelligence op over a domestic company doing stuff there are no laws against. One is using data for blatant military purposes, the other is trying to make a buck selling marketing research... one is a dire emergency, the other is frankly not.

It would very much be in line with historic CCP tactics to try and bog down the ban by making this about a very complex social issue instead of their malicious behavior. They tried doing that when Huawei got canned. We need to quit giving these bad actors the time they need to shore up the damage and remind the likes of Xi he has zero authority here, however much he thinks otherwise. They literally fly spy ops and demand we return their property because they think they had a right to our airspace...

Pop him in the nose for a change, same with Putin, they'll be reeling for years that someone actually struck back for a change. Chamberlain is not a good role model here...

I know you're right, but I just have a hard time getting over the social networks that literally helped to cause an insurrection in the US getting off scot-free. TikTok will probably get banned but then Facebook and Twitter will continue to destabilize the country with impunity.

 

[Deleted member 859859]

I still say that if a social media company being controlled by a foreign government with whom we have an openly antagonistic relationship is problematic (and I do not dispute this assertion), then the same underlying concerns should apply to the power of all social media platforms. Or has everyone just developed amnesia about the role of Facebook in the 2016 election or the genocide in Myanmar? In both cases, there was foreign influence (and data exfiltration) in addition to domestic actors.

Regulate this shit instead of arbitrarily picking winners and losers because the three-letter-agencies are afraid of losing access to their easy-peasy data collection platforms.

If TikTok had a Cambridge analytica moment then what is the US gonna do? Who’s the Mark Zuckerberg that congress will call? Is it someone in china who won’t give a shit?

Most importantly will TikTok pay like $700 million in fines/bribe to the government like Mark did to not testify? Cuz congress actually cares about that the most.

 

[ItIsWhatItIs]

August 1st, 2020 - President Trump suggests banning TikTok due to national security concerns. He is largely panned by the media and news sites. It was stated that there was no reason to ban as the security concerns were minimal or unfounded. (https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/31/tech/tiktok-trump-bytedance-sale/index.html)

March 16, 2023 - President Biden is hailed by the media for issuing and ultimatum to TikTok. He is recognized as taking decisive action against the obvious national security concerns.

Huh. So weird.

 

[SDreamer]

Do we ban Amazon next? Have you seen all the knock offs on there from China? I bet they ship free with a built in mic and webcam on some of those electronics.

 

[timber]

As a Brit is funny to see the US complain about TikTok having to hand over data if China asks for it, but a few years back the US was happy to pass the CLOUD Act allowing US law enforcement to force US companies to hand over data even if it is hosted outside the US or held by a non-US part of the company. (The act stemmed from the FBI being unhappy Microsoft US wouldn't handover data being stored by Microsoft Ireland in the EU).

The EU comission is well aware of the cloud act and that makes any US cloud provider unreliable.
But you can juggle two balls at the same time

 

[drjekel_mrhyde]

Boo woo to China. You'll have to just buy that data just like everyone else. To the people thinking Tik Tok is the bane of humanity, another one will just take its place.

 

[Ninja Puffin]

The age old "but what about the children!!!!" argument, the very same reason Florida and Texas are banning books left and right and doing their darndest to felonize a man wearing a dress. Both sides of the aisle have been trying to use "Save the Children!!!!" whataboutism for decades here in the US, when it all really boils down to control. I appreciate what you're saying, but we don't need total bans (from either party), not in this country anyway. Regulations, sure, banning? bah.

Somebody else above said "China bans our shit constantly, we should ban them back for once!!!" - Well no, there's a reason why China bans shit constantly, it's an authoritarian country. we're not that way (tho headed in that direction, wtf) and this is the line, the freedom to choose, that separates our society from theirs.

Bull. Kids don't have the same decision making capacity as adults. That's why we don't let them sign contracts, vote, drink, smoke, etc. Banning TikTok for violating kids' privacy (of for that matter harming kids' mental health) has nothing to with banning drag.

 

[Naul Laul]

“experienced Washington advisers” – aka traitors.

“The US hasn’t been able to prove with evidence that TikTok threatens US national security,” Wenbin said” – they don’t have to. Trading with China is self-harm even without any direct malicious intent. Every dollar and euro we send over there is feeding the monster.


This won’t solve anything. Only leaving the WTO and erecting high import tariffs will reroute trade from adversaries/enemies to friendly countries and military allies.

This is a waste of time we don’t have.

 

[dddddddd207]

How on earth can you not tell the difference between fascist state actor and random western media company?

I suggest you read some history so you can learn what fascists will do to this planet, and you, in order to rule you.

I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm saying that the use of that data in the recommendation algorithm is the important part here, not the data itself. I don't think that Facebook and TikTok are the same: I know that the Facebook algorithm's primary purpose is to sell ads, but I think the TikTok algorithm's primary purpose will be to influence public sentiment. I see how I didn't make that terribly clear in my original post, sorry.

 

[xoe]

Any country that has a large portion of its citizens consuming a large portion of their information on a platform controlled by an adversarial country is incredibly vulnerable to information operations.

We already know that Russia has orchestrated protests and counter protests in the US. This without even controlling the platform in question.

All an adversary controlling a platform like TikTok, YouTube, or Instagram needs to do in order to literally spark mass violence is wait for a triggering event, and tweak their algorithm slightly to surface more incendiary content while suppressing content that will calm people.

 

[DaVuVuZeLa]

Republicans are going to weaponize this. Sure they wanted to ban it too, but because a Democrat is in the office now, the Republicans are going to say "banning apps? No free speech? Dictatorship! Democrats will tell you what apps to use and not use!"

The next presidential election isn't far away. And unless DeSantis* and Trump tear each other apart, Republicans might win office again.

Is data collecting by any corporation a good thing? Hell no, but can't make unpopular decisions like this when the regular population doesn't understand the inner details.

*I was gonna call DeSantis DeSatan but then realized Satan is far more chill and level headed.

All you have to do is Jedi Mind Trick the GOP by telling them that TikTok is a woke app and they'll fall over themselves trying to kill it.

 

[rosen380]

It depends on the denomination. Some believe God plays The Sims with free will enabled, others believe he disables that setting.

Of course I was responding to "If God is omniscient and plans everything..." -- that doesn't seem to leave a lot of room for free will.

If god's plan was for a particular four-year-old toddler in Texas to go on to something special and using free will, their parent left a loaded gun out so that a three-year-old sibling could shoot and kill the four-year-old-- then what?

That god was either not really omniscient or planning everything, because they would have accounted for that in the plan... or they are omniscient and planned it, which means that god's plan was specifically that this four-year-old had to be shot and killed.

So, we get to pick. God knows all and has things planned the way he wants and they are a monster... or god doesn't know all and doesn't really have a plan and the killing was a result of an adult exercising free will.


https://abc7.com/child-shot-killed-...medium=website&utm_content=link&ICID=ref_fark

 

[dawul]

should be

People need to stop treating businesses in China like they are businesses here when in reality they are all directly or indirectly arms of the government.

The US isn't much better. No, I'm not saying the US and China are the same, I know there's differences. But why are US companies exempt from hoarding up data about users and disseminating propaganda or manipulating the public en-masse? Why is it that the US trusts US companies to not manipulate the public in ways that don't favor the US? Perhaps it's because business interests in the US don't actually care about that, and US business interests are what controls what the US government cares about.

If the government was actually concerned about the public being manipulated or having tons of data gathered on them, then they wouldn't allow any company, domestic or foreign, to have this much control over the public.

If it's dangerous for China to have all this data or influence on US citizens, then it's dangerous for ANY organization to have it.

 

[mcrnxuesen]

Banning TikTok without a smoking gun would mean the end of Silicon Valley hegemony over the global Internet. Every other government will see this and start banning US corporations in order to promote their own national champions.

 

[s73v3r]

Making your own decisions about what to share is one thing for adults as long as they limit themselves to their own data, but it's another thing when minors are involved, and TikTok is incredibly popular with teens and pre-teens.

Ok, and? Do we say they can't go on Instagram or Facebook or Snapchat? No? Then why TikTok?

 

[s73v3r]

I'm uninterested in playing footsie with the whataboutism that will land here any minute. The PRC is Bad, Actually, and this is long overdue.

There's no whataboutism to be had. Facebook and Google collect the same fucking data, and are more than happy to turn it over to the US when asked. And the US Government is able to actually affect me, unlike China.

 

[eJohnson]

Quite frankly, America is not a good actor geopolitically. The American empire is crumbling under our feet mostly due to unbridled hegemony. Were we good stewards and leaders of the unipolar world we created, it might not be problematic and other nations would go along with our policies. But America is spinning out of control, desperate to maintain domination over the world. Ain't nobody got time for that. That's the message we are starting to hear from abroad, even at home.

 

[s73v3r]

The thing is, it's an actual national security risk.

HOW THE ACTUAL FUCK IS IT A SECURITY RISK?

Even disregarding all the incidental data they are sucking up, what happens when we get into an incident or conflict with China and they activate malware in the TikTok app that bricks everyone's phones, or overloads the cell network, or DDoS's critical infrastructure.

Your tinfoil hat is on too tight.

 

[vonDubenshire]

And does it mean that every "bad" person who ends up in hell, god knew that would happen before they were even born?

That is pretty messed up right there!

No it's not. You may see that but it would be god's game, god's rules.

Imagine yourself as a DnD dungeon master.

There you go. Now you're "pretty messed up!"

 

[Wolvenmoon]

Most of the political activism that I’ve seen shared from TikTok to other social media sites has been videos of people pointing out the hypocrisy and lies of the GOP. That kind of stuff, you can already find hours and hours of on YouTube, or Twitter, or Tumblr. And it doesn’t work the way people think it does, because the GOP doesn’t care about hypocrisy.

As well, regarding Taiwan and Ukraine: You’re gonna have to clarify what you mean by “intervention”. Because the U.S. ain’t going to war with Russia or China over Taiwan & Ukraine.

Lastly, regarding places young folk can go online to organize: We can do infinitely better than TikTok. Short-form video where the main draw is the algorithmic autoplay feature doesn’t seem like a good organizational tool, especially when you need to get facts out to a lot of people.

Re: your first point, I'm not a Tiktok user and don't have an account, so I agree. It doesn't change the GOP, but it gets folks engaged and engaged folks vote.

Re: Taiwan and Ukraine, our interventions currently are to provide weapons, munitions, and intel. That policy has been challenged by the GOP (particularly re: Ukraine) and would stop if the GOP was in complete control.

Re: Other places to organize, yes they're capable of going elsewhere to organize, similar to how Facebook and Twitter users would be better suited by migrating to Mastodon/the fediverse (which I've also never bothered with). They're also capable of showing up at the polls and don't. They're on Tiktok right now.

 

[thenamenottaken]

I don't expect anyone to present proof here, but I'm curious... How might Tiktok represent a threat to national security? And if it does, why would it make a difference who owns it or what nationality they are?
If Tiktok is violating privacy in some way that isn't standard for large scale social media apps, then that's the problem to address, not ownership.

 

[s73v3r]

I ask “what would/has China done in cases like this”? They would not hesitate to ban, require China majority ownership, etc. I say let’s play by their rules for a change.

So you advocate acting like a dictatorship.

 

[s73v3r]

Can we ban Facebook at the same time please?

Unfortunately no. Despite doing what people are afraid TikTok might do, they're a US company, and that means it's good.

This is why I cannot respect the "Ban TikTok" crowd: everything they claim TikTok could do, Facebook actually has done.

 

[s73v3r]

Why can't we do both? We should adopt stringent privacy laws/regulations. We should probably also crack down on social media companies that engineer their apps/sites to be addictive, given their effect on kids' mental health, though tough privacy laws might also help make it harder to "optimize for engagement."

You know the answer to that. Politicians will ban TikTok, part themselves on the back and say, "jobs done."

This was the best chance to get comprehensive privacy regulations and social networking reform, but everyone just had to go, "China bad!"

 

[s73v3r]

Good.

China is the worlds foremost fascist, digital, police state and we should treat them as such.

By also becoming a fascist digital police state?

 

[s73v3r]

Racism? I seriously don't understand how other peoples brains work half the time.

Literally the only argument for banning TikTok is "China bad." No one has provided a shred of evidence as to what TikTok actually did to deserve to get banned.

 

[s73v3r]

While yeah American data going to China isn't great, especially for government employees, to me as an end user it's not much worse than the data going to Facebook or Google. What I think is a more important issue is how effective TikTok's algorithm is, and how it can be used by China to manipulate American sentiments. Look at the increasing popularity of the word "unalive" as a TikTok-driven euphemism for the word "kill", or how TikTok gets people into really deep and concentrated filter bubbles. IDK if that any of that was intentional yet, but there's no doubt that it could be in the future

Facebook is used even more to manipulate sentiments. I have never heard of TikTok encouraging genocide.

 

[s73v3r]

I think the most likely national security threat is in more subversive ways that the general public would ever be aware of.

All it takes is for China to force TikTok to add some zero day into the app,

Your tinfoil hat is on too tight.

There's also the collection of aggregate data similar to Facebook, except they can use it in very illegal ways that you will have no control over.

Name one thing they can actually do that Facebook can't.

Use collected TikTok data to generate deepfakes of civil unrest in US cities

Why the actual fuck would you need TikTok to do that? Fox News does that every night.

Seed those videos into everyone's feed, and you've got a mass propoganda machine in everyone's pocket.

And what would stop them from putting them on Facebook or YouTube?

Further, if (or when, really) one of these kids grows up to be an intelligence agent, China would have all the blackmail they need to compromise that agent.

Ok, now your tinfoil hat is cutting off circulation to your brain.

You don't need evidence of these scenarios to predict it will happen... you just need this data the hands of an adversary.

Again, what the fuck would stop Facebook or one of its employees from doing the same?

 

[Dan in NY]

I have a stupid question. How do you 'ban' an app? I can see removing them from an Google, iPhone app stores. But what about those already installed, people using VPN's, desktops, etc.? Can it be done?

 

[Ninja Puffin]

You know the answer to that. Politicians will ban TikTok, part themselves on the back and say, "jobs done."

This was the best chance to get comprehensive privacy regulations and social networking reform, but everyone just had to go, "China bad!"

No. Making the perfect the enemy of the good doesn't get you the perfect. It just gets rid of the good. It's much better to start off on the best foot you can, then work to improve on that.

BTW when we're talking about politicians, Biden has called for regulating social media companies, both for privacy and for kids' mental health.

 

[s73v3r]

How on earth can you not tell the difference between fascist state actor and random western media company?

I suggest you read some history so you can learn what fascists will do to this planet, and you, in order to rule you.

Again, name one thing China can do to me that Facebook or the US government can't