Hacker News Reader

Comment by Dahoon | Hacker News Reader

>The difference between TikTok and WeChat and FB/Google/Twitter is obvious: the former are to some degree controlled by China and the latter are private entities.

How is for example Facebook better because it isn't somehow tied in to the US government? On the one hand the state still have access to all the data from Facebook it wants (NSA, warrants) but on the other they have a hard time protecting its users privacy rights. I'm not convinced private entities are any better. For a US citizen maybe Facebook is better as a private entity but for everyone else outside the US?

Personally I would rather put my data in a Chinese-owned Tiktok than an American one because of the extreme amount of data already flowing into US services. Even if Tiktok is used to spy on me I can't see how it would be any worse for an European than putting more data into US services.

View on HN

Yeah these are real problems, I agree. And US citizens should continue to put pressure on their politicians to pass more privacy-related legislation

But my point wasn't really about data collection, it was about influence and content-control. People are readily influenced by memes, ads, headlines, etc which is why such platforms are so problematic because people are not comfortable with how much influence they have and how easily misinformation is spread.

What am I less comfortable with is leaving a path open for China to have that same kind of control in the US as FB/Google/etc, but without being subject to US laws like our private entities are.

You shouldn't think that the US laws will save the day, just remember the debacle of 2016 election, where multiple foreign organizations had access to millions of voters with the tacit consent of FB. Since then FB hasn't done anything to properly address this problem.

The US government does things that aren't too good. But as far as having my data in Chinese or US intelligence's hands, I'll go with the country that won't put me in jail if one of my WeChats they monitor says something like "I don't like this country."

But if you live outside PRC and USA, who is the most likely (however unlikely) to kick down your door? I'd wager that in most of the world that would be the FBI or CIA. Maybe I'm reading the wrong news sites because I live far from Asia but I have heard of lots of raids where the FBI were involved (Piratebay for example) or CIA (extraordinary rendition) but never heard of a single time Chinese police were operating in a foreign country. Maybe I'm wrong but in my understanding it happens weekly with the US and never with the PRC.

I think loss of control is the 'quiet part' that you've hit on in this issue. Political regimes from Latin America, the Philippines, Myanmar, have used US based social media products to organize and incite harassment and violence against critics and minority groups. This is a lucrative and powerful racket that the current US administration is leveraging in a similar way and at Chinese expense. But if US eyeballs move to a platform owned by China you can envision them turning off the attention tap to vested and opposing US interests.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com