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Comment by hypeit | Hacker News Reader

It's no worse that what Facebook or Twitter does (or has done). I would prefer to have a plurality of options and not be limited to apps that are owned by countries the US deems "allies".

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But Tiktok is much worse for US citizens:

- Facebook+Twitter are US-based entities and have to follow US laws and regulations in a much more strict way than Tiktok

- They are not controlled by a politically-motivated adversarial government

You are also conflating apps "from a country" vs apps "under a country's gvmt control". I think most here would agree "apps from a plurality of countries" is a good goal to strive for, while "apps under a dictatorship's gvmt control" is not.

TikTok has to adhere to the exact same laws as Facebook and Twitter, foreign ownership doesn't change that.

Adversarial to whom? Not me, I'm far more concerned about the US government who in this case is directly limiting my choices as a US citizen.

TikTok is run out of the United States and adheres to the same laws as Twitter and Facebook. Its CEO, Shou Chew, was just at a hearing in front of Congress last month.

TikTok also claimed the data couldn’t be viewed in China and then it got exposed that the data was being viewed in China by bytedance.

Sooooooo no it doesn’t follow the same laws an its singaporean ceos claim of no links to China are his word only.

As an example, do you think a US citizen personal data is as secure from requests from the CCP in e.g. Facebook as it is in Tiktok? That TikTok executives are as liable to US laws and prosecution as Facebook execs?

>That TikTok executives are as liable to US laws and prosecution as Facebook execs?

They absolutely are - again, TikTok is an American company with American employees who can be held liable if TikTok breaks the law - e.g. Shou Chew. The problem for the government is that TikTok hasn't broken any laws.

This is a completely irrational argument, rooted solely in xenophobic appeals, that can be trivially dismissed by inverting the premise: Do Chinese citizens have more to fear from state control and monitoring of domestic social media services or those owned by companies outside China?

Those are not equivalent as I hint in my last paragraph, different countries and gvmt influence do have different risk factors. You can e.g. criticize the US gvmt in a US-based app with no consequences. Good luck doing that in China (that = criticizing the CCP on a Chinese-based app while living in China).

> You can e.g. criticize the US gvmt in a US-based app with no consequences

Oh really? Try that with your police department and see how it works out for you.

https://hellgatenyc.com/nypd-warrantless-subpoena-copwatcher...

Actually it might be the other way round. Chinese will not care if you critisize US govt in private messages, but US platform might actually report you to FBI.

They have more to fear from apps under the Chinese government's control. How does that dismiss the parent's claim?

On the other hand, a citizen should be more scared of his own govt rather than foreign govt because foreign govt won't arrest him. So for an American TikTok is probably less threat than Facebook or Twitter.

I don't even know how you reach that kind of conclusion from that fact. It's not even strictly true. If I travel to China or Russia for a trip there is absolutely nothing stopping them from arresting me. It's only true if you never travel to that foreign country.

In the case of Russia they can do worse than imprison you. Just ask any number of Russia defectors who were killed on on Western soil. This is a very poorly thought out take.

I don’t think they were talking about traveling to Russia or China, they’re talking about living in the US. The vast majority of people will not travel to China or Russsia.

For instance if you discuss doing something illegal like getting an abortion in the US, only the US government really cares about that. Whether China knows is irrelevant.

https://www.npr.org/2022/08/12/1117092169/nebraska-cops-used...

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