China passed a law a couple of years ago requiring all Chinese companies to give the government live access to their databases. Is TikTok exempt? If not, statements that the government hasn't requested any data are misleading. They don't need to.
It’s like those stories of Russians on FB making maga rally events. They don’t know it’s not an American doing things they just follow along.
I would also assume that US police and intelligence have access to Facebook, Google, etc. regardless of what anyone says.
End to end encrypted or it is not private. No exceptions.
I guess the economist has it wrong then:
> As the first consumer-facing app from China to take off in the West, TikTok is a source of pride in Beijing. But the app’s Chinese ownership makes politicians elsewhere uneasy about its tightening grip on their citizens’ attention
As in, there are apparently sub companies, that are in the US, not in china, that makes it different.
Sure, the US "sub companies" are located physically in the US and managed day-to-day by US-based employees but they are still owned by a Chinese parent company meaning at the end of the day, they still report to managers/executive in China and are obligated to follow directions given to them by people working for Chinese parent company. If the Chinese government cotrols the Chinese parent company then they, by definition, control the US-based company as well.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/12/18/zoom-he...
> The written regulations that give the Ministry of Public Security the right to just “take it” are the Regulation on Internet Security Supervision and Inspection by Public Security Organs (公安机关互联网安全监督检查规定).
But the law in question http://www.gov.cn/gongbao/content/2018/content_5343745.htm doesn't actually grant public security organs the right to just "take it" as the blog post claims. Having the authority to request on-site network security audits or do penetration tests would certainly give spies ample opportunity to find ways to exfiltrate data, but that doesn't mean they're legally allowed to do so.
I guess not many people care whether Chinese intelligence agencies spy on TikTok users legally or extralegally, but I just wanted to know whether there really was such a law. Apparently not.
Absolutely zero separation between Chinese and American business regardless of what they claim.
Yeah, just like US. TikTok isn't any different from, say, YouTube in this regard.
Completely different to China just having access to that data.
It's no wonder that the largely liberal audience of HN supports the subversion route the US takes compared to the more brutal but vastly more honest way the Chinese do it.