Hacker News Reader

Comment by robg | Hacker News Reader

Yeah, failing to see how TikTok is any different or worse than Facebook or Google. Could someone enlighten me?

Could someone enlighten me? Chinese 2017 National Security Law Article 7 says "Any organization and citizen shall support, assist and cooperate with national intelligence work in accordance with the law" [1]. This law says TikTok must obey and help the Chinese government national intelligence.

The concern is that although you live in Canada, US, Europe; you can still be "arrested" by Chinese police working in hidden police departments in the Canada, US, and Europe [2]. And TikTok will tell them where you are. From the second article: FBI director Christopher Wray told a US Senate hearing in November that attempts by China to set up a police presence on US soil "violates sovereignty and circumvents standard judicial and law enforcement cooperation processes".

[1] http://www.npc.gov.cn/npc/c30834/201806/483221713dac4f31bda7... [2] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64909560

Under the ironically-named USA Freedom Act, the US government has essentially the same powers. My country doesn't have an extradition treaty with China, but it does have one with the US. There's no evidence that citizens of my country have ever been disappeared by China and taken to secret prisons, but there's documentary evidence that the US have done exactly that.

I'm genuinely trying to think of a good-faith argument for why Chinese tech firms are less trustworthy than American tech firms, but I honestly can't think of one.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_security_letter

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_rendition

Still a problem from a USA national security standpoint.

But absolutely agreed -- as a user, I can't trust any of these governments or companies. The only things I do trust are E2EE services that don't collect unnecessary personal data in the first place.

I thought about asking what country you were from, but I realized it doesn't matter.

I'm from the United States and I want this app banned. While the things you cite are or could be bad, it's entirely irrelevant to dealing with an app that is demonstrably a psychological control system. You're upset that CIA or US Army spec ops kidnapped people from your country? Imagine the United States injecting a social media system into your country that brainwashes people into thinking that they deserved it. TikTok can do this.

The US let Meta whatever they want and do all the harmful things to our youths psych. Like increased suicide rates, body issues and much more.

I agree with the poster before, I don't see the big difference here

I'm a neotech-luddite and think all social media should be banned, so you're not going to get an argument from me on how terrible Meta is.

You admit that social media is bad and increases suicide rates, yes? Okay great, seems logical then to ban the app that's run by a country that has set out to actively degrade the country the app is deployed in.

Here's how I know that TikTok is some sort of psyop: it's an entirely separate app in China. The algorithm does different things, explicitly. I don't know why people are so hostile to the idea that finally we've found a capitalistic company that should be punished for exploiting people. That Meta and Google behave badly is entirely irrelevant, and you and everyone else doing the same whataboutism dance knows it.

> Here's how I know that TikTok is some sort of psyop: it's an entirely separate app in China. The algorithm does different things, explicitly.

Can you explain that a bit more? Of course it's going to behave differently. Any serious multinational is going to tailor their offerings to local preferences. A McDonald's in India sells a significantly different menu than one in Indiana. As for it being a seperate app rather than clicking a country flag during onboarding or whatever, I can see plenty of reasonable technical reasons for that.

I'd think they probably have even more freedom than most players to do so, because they didn't have to play to significant established brand expectations on arrival.

Whataboutism are also all the arguments brought up in this thread against tiktok.

I honestly don't care. I don't use either and actively dislike all of these echo chambers. If it's for me ban all of them, or let them get even worse I don't care. It doesn't influence me at all.

But this is just a shitshow, cold war on a weird social level. This is not against tiktok this is obviously mainly a topic to talk bad about China.

Well, we can't talk bad about China. That would be ... rude.

“Demonstrably” a psychological control system? Go on then, demonstrate it.

> Imagine the United States injecting a social media system into your country that brainwashes people into thinking that they deserved it.

LOL! Please reread thus again until you lol too :D

Ever heard of Voice of America radio? From the end of WW2 to the Cold War, all they did was broadcast counter-propaganda in Soviet controlled Europe.

VoA isn't an algorithm that can manipulate you into making purchases you otherwise wouldn't. Those in Eastern Europe are probably thankful that a short wave radio program existed in the 1980s, before the Wall fell. If your point is that America broadcasts propaganda, then yes I'll concede the point. But it's entirely irrelevant.

Why were blue jeans and Michael Jackson cassettes highly coveted then?

That isn't arguing the "worse" part. Facebook is also going to support, assist, etc, with US national intelligence services. You can be black-bagged anywhere in the world by the US too, they are pretty famous for how far the arm of US law reaches.

On the bright side, the U.S. and China aren’t cooperating. If they were that would be a whole other level of fuckery.

(Probably the only silver lining of this geopolitical “competition” right now.)

Yes, when required by court order. The USA has a court of laws, proposed by legislatures we vote for. Who knows about China.

> the FISA court granted 33,942 warrants, with only 12 denials – a rejection rate of 0.03 percent of the total requests.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Intellig...

Do you have any evidence that supports that being the case in practice? Can you have evidence of it? Whenever we get a peek behind the curtain it generally seems like warrants are not a factor.

That belief has to ultimately be a statement of faith. It is basically counting on highly untrustworthy people behaving honestly - they probably aren't. And all the elements of the system are hidden where there is no accountability.

It's an appeal to a written system of laws that has continuity. China doesn't have this, it has Xi and the Party. These whataboutisms are tiresome because they're so shallow. They're shallow in that they evoke a criticism of some aspect of how the United States manages itself as a method of deflecting from the quite awful and well evidenced way that CCP runs China.

How do you expect to compare Google to TikTok without "whataboutisms"? Comparison is whataboutism!

It is just a fact that Google and the US intelligence apparatus are more invasive than TikTok and the Chinese. The former combo spy and conspire against almost literally the range of Trump to Afghan goat herders. TikTok can compete with that, but it can't exceed it.

If I could pick one, I'd feel much safer being spied on the Chinese than the Americans. They've got much less ability to make my life hell. Look at how far Snowden had to run, and how Assange never ran far enough.

>It is just a fact that Google and the US intelligence apparatus are more invasive than TikTok and the Chinese.

This isn't a fact, and that people pretend that it is is a strange contortion of reality that I'm really struggling to understand. CCP is actively using a vast state-sponsored surveillance apparatus to do things like build actual (not imagined) concentration camps. And your reaction to these facts is to imagine that the American state's reaction to its secrets being exposed - regardless of how noble that action was - is the same thing. It's clearly not. For your comparison to be worthwhile, you have to pretend that CIA and NSA are co-owners of Meta and Google and have the means to use it to move elections and public opinion (foreign and domestic) in the way the American regime wants. Is this what you're claiming?

Well, the question of coups hasn't come up so far in the conversation but I am happy to claim that. They're media companies, and as we've learned from the history of journalism media companies do tend to put their finger on the scale when it comes to elections. There isn't really a question of whether US social media companies are actively influencing elections after the so-called Twitter Files and although there hasn't been a scandal involving the intelligence agencies influencing foreign elections yet.

But it is coming. We know the US regularly heads out to topple foreign governments. It just isn't plausible that they'd ignore the influence of US social media companies when they do that. Certainly I think India and the EU would have to be a bit crazy to give Facebook & friends free access to their population. I expect there is a faction at Google who have Modi voodoo dolls on hand.

> It's clearly not.

I have no doubt it is clear to you, but the term for that is 'bias'. If you are in a Western country, you're probably safer with TikTok because it is less influential than the US media companies and the Chinese spying and renditioning apparatus is less sophisticated. China are also much more passive (not exactly by choice, it must be said) and won't use the data for targeting missile strikes on your military leaders.

Respectfully, I think you have this backwards.

The experience that some Americans have, perhaps those who work in technology in particular, can make you fairly hostile to all of the above. I'm not denying that CIA or NSA or the US State Department use Meta or other social media systems to influence elections or governments abroad. I'm making two specific observations: 1) CIA/NSA are not part owners in those companies, and that's a very significant difference from how TikTok exists, where Bytedance is a CCP controlled organization and is part owner in the subsidiary that operates in the US; and 2) My hostility to TikTok is an extension of my hostility to Meta et al.

Eventually our discussion will horseshoe and we'll end up saying basically the same thing. These companies are all terrible, but the specific defense of TikTok will remain bizarre to me, because when you admit that Facebook can influence or tip elections you have to also admit that TikTok can do this too. And it's reasonable to ban it because it's controlled by a power that has publicly stated it wishes to harm the United States.

>I have no doubt it is clear to you, but the term for that is 'bias'.

It is not "bias" to point out that there is a difference between putting dissenters in prison camps and what the US did to Assange. Both are bad, but to imagine these things as the same is a bridge too far for me.

> It's an appeal to a written system of laws that has continuity.

Reproductive health laws and book bans in the USA notwithstanding. And we wonder why faith in institutions is plummeting.

Reproductive health laws in the US are now about the same as Germany's, and there are no books being banned.

Extraordinary rendition has no laws backing it. The US government simply ignores any cases with a "State Secrets" statement. This is a known practice that happens in the US and other countries.

How many other extraordinary practices without a legal framework does the US government have?

Biden chose to have private intelligence groups monitor social media because they circumvent people's rights. What other rights do they abuse?

Do you have an example of someone being arrested by Chinese intelligence on foreign soil, let alone due to TikTok data?

The actual tactics underpinning the CCP’s anticorruption campaign are much more unsavory. These include at a minimum surveillance, physical threats, and family intimidation in order to force exiles to return “voluntarily” to China. In October 2020, the US Department of Justice accused eight individuals of acting as illegal agents of China in a multiyear campaign of harassment and stalking in order to coerce an unnamed Chinese individual to return to face trial.68 In 2018, US intelligence officials alleged off the record to Foreign Policy that Chinese agents had beaten and drugged multiple individuals in Australia, returning them to China by boat.69

https://freedomhouse.org/report/transnational-repression/chi...

You can read about one called “Operation Fox Hunt” here on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Fox_Hunt?wprov=sfti1

No arrests in this example but still quite concerning.[1]

Power can be used without needing to publicly arrest someone

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/dec/22/tiktok-by...

What stops China from just buying this data from data collection companies like the FBI and police do? Seems like that’d be much easier

Theoretically, export control laws could (not sure if they do). We regulate selling all kinds of things to foreign governments.

Nothing. It won't be asked at a hearing because it might be embarrassing to reveal that corporations and law enforcement use this against American civlians already. Jan 6th rioters were detected using cell phone geolocation signals as well as video.

Wouldn't be surprised if they are compelled not to sell the info by the government. Also wouldn't be surprised if they've been buying it this entire time, either.

pr the darkweb?

Common arguments are that those two you listed are American-owned; that China bans US tech giants; that the CCP has outsized control of Chinese companies (and the data that they collect); and that TikTok's algorithm purposefully promotes content that will result in an uneducated, divided population in countries outside of China.

I am not saying that those are true or that I agree with them, but those seem to be the typical arguments.

From a outside perspective content on tiktok is no worse than Facebook, Instagram or Reddit. The main thing you notice about TikToks algorithm is that it's less a echo chamber and more inklusive to alternative content.

Really helpful, thank you. Still don’t see the problem, other than the need to educate kids on digital hygiene. But like anything, I bet they already know the harms of overconsumption.

> kids

Not sure it's just kids

I decided on a "paradigm shift" into a healthy lifestyle about 10 years ago. Cut down on American media and culture.

I was an adult who thought drinking coke was normal. Now I drink water.

> Still don’t see the problem

China can access some target in the US who is on tictok and get their realtime location.

They said they're not using GPS; and, my iPhone hasn't revealed TikTok asking for my GPS location, so this means if they're tracking location, it's based on preferences, watching times, IP address or something else not GPS-related, all of which are wholely accessible to every single website on the internet, those hosted in China and any other country.

Know anyone that uses AliExpress? Or plays Genshin Impact?

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/emilybakerwhite/tiktok-...

To give a rebuttal to these points:

1. China banned Facebook after it refused to cooperate with law enforcement following the Urumqi riots. Google and others decided the cost of following censorship laws was too high compared to the return and decided to retreat. Other American tech giants like Microsoft, Apple and IBM have a presence in China. However unjust China's laws may be, there's a qualitative differences between applying it to all companies in the same way vs. what the US is attempting to do with TikTok.

2. From an American point of view, this strikes true. For the rest of the world there's hardly a difference. If any, the US has proved it is willing to enforce its will globally against non-citizens with all means possible (see fe. Julian Assange).

3. Youtubes algorithm is strongly driven by controversy, Instagram seems to be responsible for a large amount of body dismorphia and depression in young people. I'm all for more research and stricter policies to suppress this, but just claiming things without a shred of evidence isn't helping the discussion along.

TikTok is no better or worse than Facebook or Google. US is just mad it can't boss Tik Tok around like they can any other tech giant. Because TikTok has ties to the Chinese government, there's a national security concern about what information they collect and share with China. The whole "save the children" angle is pure optics. These politicians couldn't give a rat's about it but they know the public is so fed up with "toxic" social media they're using the excuse that it's psychologically damaging to children to go after it. The government never seems to place any burden on parenting. But when they're being left out of the spynet is only when they care.

It's not any worse, just that it likely works with the CCP as opposed to the NSA, and the US obviously considers that a threat.

I think it'd be more productive for the US Congress to regulate the online space and the (ab)use of people's data/identity regardless of where the company is based in than to downright ban foreign companies. The latter seems rather... un-American.

Because they're "not an American company" - so they make a great target.

Now what is an American company? Well, I don't really have a clue, companies certainly aren't patriotic citizens and we have no expectation of that even if they're entirely domestic... but once they're global? Well, then they can just jump their headquarters around to get the most advantageous tax laws and liability.

We should hold all social media companies to the same level of accountability because while TikTok might be openly cozy to the chinese government if you think any corporations are on the side of the American people I have a bridge to sell you.

CCP is a board member at ByteDance.

https://prosperousamerica.org/ccp-takes-board-seat-at-byteda...

This whole thing is so strange. People in the US were so concerned about Russia running ads for a few thousand dollars in 2016 during the elections but are now ok with TikTok being controlled by CCP?

As always, take every comment with a grain of salt.

Honestly, I think this is refreshing. If anything, it's an acknowledgement that the info gathered and shared by social media to their respective governments is indeed, very useful.

Sure, it might be hypocritical. But it's a win, either way.

For me I don't really care if they are better or worse, I'm just tired of Chinese companies milking the open the market while being protected in their own. If these companies want to participate in the other markets then they should lobby their government to open up more.

China and the US are the two most common plaintiffs in WTO cases, so they are not rolling into foreign markets unopposed.

Basing on experience and facts I can only say that since TikTok is new and hasn't had many scandals yet, their privacy reviews and processes internally are not mature or not a priority yet compared to other FANG companies that have been burned by it. And why should they prioritize it over growth? I spoke to devs, and they didn't care at all about their privacy reviews. I'm not a TikTok fan, but this behavior was the same as other FANG companies early days. Yet they are being treated different?

It’s very, very simple. So long as China continues to ban US social media companies and search engines, whatever reason they have for doing so is a valid reason for the US and other western countries to respond in kind and ban Chinese social media companies. Not just from a military or security standpoint but also an economic one.

If TikTok is “not a threat” then neither is Facebook and Google. End of story.

Is the pissy-fight back and forth between two world powers worth the 150M people that have gotten more useful news than we have in years; *and* the millions of small businesses that have been able to get off the ground due to TikTok's algorithm helping them find the right audience?

Absolutely. Without question.

>It’s very, very simple.

It's not that simple. China has laws that US social media/search engine companies are not willing to follow but AFAICT TikTok abides by every US law that exists.

It is that simple. Chinese “laws” created in such a way to keep American social media and tech giants out. We can just create our own corresponding law.

>We can just create our own corresponding law.

America cant keep its promises to its citizens and do what you are describing at the same time. It's now choosing the latter and chipping away at the former.

You should read the RESTRICT act that just passed.

"Never let a good crisis (real or manufactured) go to waste" always works on an amnesiatic society. At some point the pro-tiktok ban crowd will realize just how much of their 1st and 4th amendment rights they have lost.

> At some point the pro-tiktok ban crowd will realize just how much of their 1st and 4th amendment rights they have lost.

Yes, Tik Tok developers are likely to use the algorithm to help defend the company.

> America cant keep its promises to its citizens and do what you are describing at the same time. It's now choosing the latter and chipping away at the former.

What specific promise are you referring to?

>What specific promise are you referring to?

>1st and 4th amendment rights

Read the RESTRICT Act and tell me you honestly believe it isn't vague enough to be abused.

> So long as China continues to ban US social media companies and search engines

Its just bizzare to know that China bans those companies yet US allows Chinese social media companies to run in US.

Not bizarre. America's ideology is capitalism and free trade. Obviously China never signed up for that.

It makes sense when you understand that

1 America is the superpower

2 they want to destroy any and all competition

When powers clash things happen. See WW1. At least war is unlikely since both sides have nukes.

No one is saying it, but this is mostly tit-for-tat punishment for china doing this to US companies

Fomenting civil unrest and disunity should be under the exclusive control of US corporations! /s

Here, enlighten yourself

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/what-drives-high-profile-...

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/huawei-helped-create-tech...

One main reason that TikTok can be worse is subtle propaganda. There is a very subtle pro-Chinese bias on TikTok and that's beneficial for China in the long term. The more that your rival's population perceives you as a threat, the harder it is to compete against them.

In what other trade context would it be ok for one partner to block all access to their own market (Facebook, Twitter etc) whilst still enjoying full access to everybody else's? How is this remotely acceptable?

This is incorrect, Neither are banned in Taiwan, which the US recognizes as part of China.

Lol...fairly desperate semantics there.

The original comment claims that US social networks are banned in China, which they are not.

No one is claiming that America has "banned abortion" despite it's unavailable for 1/3 of American women, i.e. those living in the 11 states that have banned it[0].

[0] https://reproductiverights.org/abortion-illegal-11-states/

Taiwan is not part of China, period. Nation states have a policy of "strategic ambiguity" as a matter of diplomatic convenience but the US is not considering supplying weaponry to Taiwan because it is part of China.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/taiwans-military-us-arms-...

Something something china bad

They're not bribing US politicians, which is why there is now unprecedented "bipartisan" support for banning TikTok, because we need to protect the children or not.

> Tiktok's lobbying tops $5.4M in 2022 as it brings its charm offensive to Congress

https://www.npr.org/2023/03/22/1165249928/tiktok-congress-he...

Their head lobbyist (Michael Beckerman) was seated right behind the CEO during testimony. He leads their government relations office in DC.

That's a quarter of what meta/facebook spends, I guess tiktok cheaped out on the politicians they bought.

Politicians can pick and choose who to offer their venality to. Not a lot to be gained politically from shilling for a Chinese corporation.

While privacy is an issue on TikTok, I would say the more concerning stuff is that they are actively curating speech: they frequently ban content critical of the CCP, promote pro-ccp messaging, and also sometimes they harass journalists using information that has a somewhat reasonable expectation of privacy. There is a suspicion that they bump up divisive content, but that's harder to prove since obviously Facebook and Google do this too. But douyin does the opposite, it bumps up non-divisive content.

Surely the concern for the West is less that TikTok influences content within China and more that they can subtly steer a foreign audience?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com