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Comment by walrus01 | Hacker News Reader

> I get "you are too paranoid"

I also get "But all the big US tech companies do it too.."

Frankly I would much rather that all my private data/whatever go to the hands of the NSA and/or CSE, GCHQ than the Ministry of State Security in Beijing.

At least I have a moderate level of confidence in my actual free speech rights, civil rights and legal rights in the US and Canadian legal systems.

Every domestic Chinese company with "cloud" based whatever is legally obligated to set up a database replication export to the MSS. With active engineering cooperation to make it work correctly.

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I am not sure about this.

If the thought of stalking my social graph, whereabouts and interests didn't outright creep me out (regardless of who is stalking), I would be more comfortable with something Chinese than American.

I am not a person of interest to China - even if I do have anti-CCP sentiments, I have zero influence on them so it's not worth their time nor resources to enact extrajudicial punishment on me. Xi doesn't give a shit what some random schmuck in a Western country thinks about him. I'd have to be very influential for them to give a shit about me, at which point I'd have many reasons not to use social media (whether American or Chinese) anyway.

I would be more of a person of interest to my local government (which - as most Western governments - are a puppet to America) because if anything, I have at least some influence/leverage on them in the form of voting and generally being involved in the local community/industry, and they would need much less resources to punish/intimidate me if they so desire.

Yeah because the US govt isn't compromised by Russians, and politcians on their payroll. Lets just ignore the capabilities of Cambridge analytica and how they are able to persuade the mass population with psy ops. I feel like I'm in crazy world right now

US provided weapons have been killing a lot of Russians lately with bipartisan support. Russia should probably raise their salaries.

yes if you follow the news, theres definitely a group within congress that wants to end support to Ukraine.

Many of the same group, that coincidentally enough, seem to really love Orban in Hungary.

NSA can refer it to federal police who can use it for parallel construction at home to imprison you if they wish to retaliate against you for something they don’t like.

CCP can’t do that.

Surveillance by police that have jurisdiction over you is more dangerous than those who do not.

> CCP can’t do that.

They can they just don’t need to. They can just disappear you. There’s documented evidence of the Chinese gov torturing, defiling, political dissidents but you’re worried about parallel construction from the NSA.

As a reminder, for parallel construction to work you need to have actually done something illegal, which the NSA then backtracks to build a case against you. For the Chinese gov to throw you into an unmarked van and press you into slave labor all they need is to tell someone to do it.

These aren’t even close to the same.

https://www.amazon.com/Three-Felonies-Day-Target-Innocent/dp...

You are incorrect.

Aside from the fact that the accuracy of that book has been seriously questioned, your bringing it up doesn't refute what you were replying to. You need to have committed a crime for parallel construction to apply. Yes, there are a lot of laws and a lot of crimes defined in the U.S. Code, and people do get ensnared by laws that they didn't know existed. But that doesn't change the U.S. constitutional guarantee of due process.

Why can’t they? Sure, they can’t just call up the FBI or other US law enforcement agencies and refer the matter.

However, they can absolutely use the threat of disclosure of sensitive information to blackmail or otherwise coerce someone. The threat (real or perceived) many times is worse than the reality.

I’d say they each have the capability to cause harm, but the incentives/motivations/safeguards that might drive (or inhibit) them to do so are drastically different.

Like the FBI did to Martin Luther King Jr?

This is just as much a problem in the US.

It is not "just as much a problem in the US". China's treatment of dissidents is far, far worse than the US's. It's not even close. Every reputable political ranking organization, from Freedom House to The Economist, confirms this.

I think they both extend up to the maximum of torture/murder, so I don’t really see how either is “worse” or “better”.

Are you planning to be equivalent in notoriety/influence as Martin Luther King Jr? If not, the motivation/incentives for domestic law enforcement to target you aren’t really there. It would be a waste of their time and finite resources.

The PRC has a bit different motivations/incentives and theirs are not aligned with a perceived U.S. national security interest.

Whether you and I agree with the US national security apparatus's mission, in my opinion, it is at least more oriented towards safeguarding/promoting the US’ self-interest.

That’s not to say I agree with all of its actions, just trying to explain what I mean when I say there is difference in motivations and incentives.

I mean, the CCP can straight up kidnap me internationally if they want to.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-19/china-operations-to-f...

So can the CIA.

Yes and I’m scared of the CIA too, what’s your point? Your consistent whataboutisms up and down this thread are as hilarious as they are sad.

My point is that domestic surveillance poses more of a potential threat to you than foreign surveillance.

That depends on who you are. And if that’s your point, you should just make that point instead of Reddit-like single sentence whataboutisms.

China just assaulted and kidnapped HK protesters in the UK.

It's not whataboutism when the entire thread started with a comparison. To discuss it further is just... normal. What the hell.

It’s not just here. In every thread on this page that commenter is piping up with single sentence whataboutisms.

“But the CIA” is not “discuss[ing] it further” either. I’d be happy to discuss it properly. But reddit-like pithy stuff like this is not that.

Oh and China just assaulted and kidnapped protesters in the UK. Like, within the last couple of hours.

>Frankly I would much rather that all my private data/whatever go to the hands of the NSA and/or CSE, GCHQ than the Ministry of State Security in Beijing.

First, please do not read anything that follows as me accepting TikTok in any way, shape, or fashion.

As a non-Chinese citizen, what exactly can the MSS do to you with all of that data? I would be much more concerned with the gov't that had authority over me having that data. I'm guessing a Chinese citizen doesn't care one wit about what the NSA/GCHQ/etc knows about them either.

> As a non-Chinese citizen, what exactly can the MSS do to you with all of that data?

- Use compromising info about you to provide China IP from your employer, and/or betray your country

- Use compromising info about a family member to force you to provide China IP from your employer, and/or betray your country

- Use compromising info about you to force a family member to provide China IP from their employer, and/or betray their country

- Use info about you to force your employer to fire you in case you have held anti-China views

- Use info about you, if you've held anti-China views, to prohibit companies from getting into contract with your company

- .... and the list goes on and on.

They could identify your Chinese-descent friends who aren't fond of The State and then coerce them into silence by threatening their family back home.

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