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Any business with china is a national security issue. There's plenty of evidence to the level of dictatorship in China. It's your responsibility to look at its

Any business with china is a national security issue. There's plenty of evidence to the level of dictatorship in China. It's your responsibility to look at its history and make reasonable conclusions from it. If you want some sort of smoking gun evidence you're not going to find it, unless you somehow have a security clearance in China good enough to gain knowledge about their operations. It's a Chinese company, they have privledges, not rights.

yibg 6y ago
Let’s not pretend this is anything other than just plain old geopolitics with TikTok caught in the middle. Going by “national security” reasons most countries should ban Facebook and google, not to mention amazon, Microsoft, oracle, Cisco etc. since the us government has already shown willingness and ability to spy on anything they can get their hands on, including foreign heads of state. Allowing US controlled social media and other tech companies is a huge risk. Of course power doesn’t balance that way so they don’t.
- Retric 6y ago
  Many countries including China do block US companies on national security grounds. National security is very much a double edged sword.
  - yibg 6y ago
    Of course the US isn’t the only country that plays this game. The government also needs to justify it some how, and I don’t even blame them for that. But at least here we can stop pretending there is some sort of objective, consistently applied standard at play.
  - howlgarnish 6y ago
    US companies operating in China need to follow Chinese laws, including those on censorship. Google etc are blocked because they are hosted outside China, and are not willing to cooperate in China. What I find bizarre about the Tiktok ban is that they are being banned essentially on executive whim: as far as I can tell, there are no concrete allegations, much less evidence, that they're violating any US laws.
    - warbaker 6y ago
      So, it's ok for China to ban Google because Google refuses to help with censorship and propaganda, and because Google doesn't want the Chinese govt to be able to spy on its citizens. But it's not OK for the US to keep out spyware. Heck, retaliation for China's banning of Google etc would be sufficient justification for banning TikTok on its own.
      - Dahoon 6y ago
        You cannot say "A" is evil because it does "X", so we will also do "X" and then still claim "A" is evil without saying you are evil yourself. What you are saying is that unless PRC becomes like the US, the US has to become like PRC. I'm amazed how this is not clear to anyone following this. The only way to go forward and not become what you are pointing fingers at is taking the high road. The US is clearly not doing so.
      - Talanes 6y ago
        If we retaliate against every country that has disallowed something that is allowed in America, we're going to run out of imports very quickly.
      - Cthulhu_ 6y ago
        Oh but it is ok, it's just that there's no good legal precedence for it yet. Plus it goes against the US's low restrictions and limitations on doing business.
      - powersnail 6y ago
        It’s obviously not okay for China to ban Google. That’s why China gets criticized for it constantly, by both the west and its own citizens. If US wants to retaliate China by becoming more China, well, surely China isn’t the only one getting hurt.
        eru 6y ago
        Yes. It's the same situation as 'retaliating' to tariffs with tariffs of your own. It's like butting your head against the wall to teach the other fellow not to but his own head against the wall.
- kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
  The immediate security issues are more with WeChat but TikTok gives them a social graph of Western youth documenting their foibles. These are all prospects for future moles when they get jobs in sensitive positions.
- mrpopo 6y ago
  > Going by “national security” reasons most countries should ban Facebook and google, not to mention amazon, Microsoft, oracle, Cisco etc. since the us government has already shown willingness and ability to spy on anything they can get their hands on, including foreign heads of state. Allowing US controlled social media and other tech companies is a huge risk. Yes.
- blato 6y ago
  > Going by “national security” reasons most countries should ban Facebook and google, not to mention amazon, Microsoft, oracle, Cisco etc. since the us government has already shown willingness and ability to spy on anything they can get their hands on, including foreign heads of state. Allowing US controlled social media and other tech companies is a huge risk. Yes. As a European, I believe in Europe (and in the rest of the world) we should definitively ban most US tech be it for ethical reasons or national security. Same for China. EU Politicians don't seem to understand the situation yet, but given the current technological cold war happening, I hope we'll wake up soon and switch either to open tech or at least to our own local tech.
  - warninglights 6y ago
    I think this the key issue against National Security. The US has used its tech to spy on everybody else and and using Trump logic nobody should use it. Free trade is over China's tech could also be used, but I am not a Trump supporter. I would be more afraid of Trump facist controlled NSA backdoors monitoring me than CCP seeing my dance moves
zmmmmm 6y ago
I guess at minimum I'd expect a non-partisan investigation to substantiate that, and then for it to be applied on an equal basis to all companies with similar issues. Some element of the first may have, but I have no awareness of the second part.
bduerst 6y ago
>It's a Chinese company, they have privledges, not rights. Neither Bytedance nor TikTok are Chinese companies. It's true that Bytedance has buildings in Beijing, and a Chinese app (Taotiao) that is a Chinese subsidiary, but Bytedance is a Cayman's Islands company and TikTok doesn't even have servers inside China. For purposes of the Chinese National Intelligence Law compelling the company to share user information with the CCP, Apple shares way more user data than TikTok does.
- jjulius 6y ago
  >... Bytedance is a Cayman's Islands company... Sure, it's incorporated in the Caymans, but we all know that that is just a technicality.
  - Cthulhu_ 6y ago
    Like every other company operating from the Caymans; tax evasion.
    - eru 6y ago
      If you keep everything legal, I think it's called tax optimisation.
- unishark 6y ago
  Yet somehow the Chinese government can control the export of their technology and needs to approve any deal with a US company? https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/china-unlikely-approve-tiktok-deal-oracle-walmart-state-owned-paper-n1240676 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/china-unlikely-approve-ti...
  - eru 6y ago
    Well, the US also controls lots of companies that are not American. Especially in finance. They were handing out American sanctions for European banks doing business with Iranian companies.
ygjb 6y ago
Ok, but how is Tik Tok a national security issue, but the fact that damn near every electronic device available on the market is manufactured in or out of components manufactured in China doesn't seem to be one?
- FractalParadigm 6y ago
  It actually has been a problem before, in rather recent memory I may add [0]. China is, for all intents and purposes, a bad actor. They keep positioning themselves infinitely closer to "the line" without seemingly ever being able to cross it, even when they're caught red-handed undermining US security. [0] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-10-04/the-big-hack-how-china-used-a-tiny-chip-to-infiltrate-america-s-top-companies https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-10-04/the-big-h...
  - wonnage 6y ago
    This is a poor example because it wound up being more about Bloomberg's shoddy reporting https://www.servethehome.com/investigating-implausible-bloomberg-supermicro-stories/ https://www.servethehome.com/investigating-implausible-bloom...
  - the-dude 6y ago
    The Big Hack is possible the worst example you could come up with : it is regarded as fabrication, there is no proof whatsoever.
- dfischer 6y ago
  There’s evidence online, I don’t have it handy but a quick search found this: https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/fxgi06/not_new_news_but_tbh_if_you_have_tiktiok_just_get/?sort=top https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/fxgi06/not_new_news...
  - bllguo 6y ago
    seriously? A reddit comment? By the way, they never provided any proof and even better, claimed that their laptop broke when pressed.
mytailorisrich 6y ago
> There's plenty of evidence to the level of dictatorship in China. The political regime of the countries you deal with is not a national security issue in itself, that's not what national security means. Certainly, 'dictatorship' is not a national security issue. Some of the US's "best friends" were, and are, dictatorships.
fit2rule 6y ago
I think Americans should be very, very careful about calling for 'smoking gun evidence' of state oppression, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. It is highly duplicitous to be sabre rattling over perceived ideological differences, when America's own ideology is couched in immensely contradicting - nay, hypocritical - failures to conduct state affairs according to International law. >It's a Chinese company, they have privledges, not rights. This is also true of American companies, especially those with a trillion dollar profit motive in the military-industrial endless-war market. Be very, very careful about what doors you open with statements such as this: >If you want some sort of smoking gun evidence you're not going to find it, unless you somehow have a security clearance in China good enough to gain knowledge about their operations We know all too well how tightly wrapped up in its deep state secrets America's own heinous crimes against humanity are .. and if you are so sure of your own states innocence that you feel warranted in calling for other states' downfall for similar reasons, you must surely be willing to discuss America's own human rights abuses in a similar light. No? Then the moral authority you claim does not exist.
- gabaix 6y ago
  I don’t read OP has making claims about the US having a higher morale ground. It is pretty accepted no government has the higher morale ground. You can dig enough in any past or present to find evil or good.
vkou 6y ago
Any business with anyone is a national security issue. After all, wreckers, saboteurs, and enemies of the revolution are all around us. Can you prove to me that any company, domestic or otherwise, operating in the US has its national security in mind over shareholder value?

yibg 6y ago

Let’s not pretend this is anything other than just plain old geopolitics with TikTok caught in the middle. Going by “national security” reasons most countries should ban Facebook and google, not to mention amazon, Microsoft, oracle, Cisco etc. since the us government has already shown willingness and ability to spy on anything they can get their hands on, including foreign heads of state. Allowing US controlled social media and other tech companies is a huge risk. Of course power doesn’t balance that way so they don’t.

Retric 6y ago
Many countries including China do block US companies on national security grounds. National security is very much a double edged sword.
- yibg 6y ago
  Of course the US isn’t the only country that plays this game. The government also needs to justify it some how, and I don’t even blame them for that. But at least here we can stop pretending there is some sort of objective, consistently applied standard at play.
- howlgarnish 6y ago
  US companies operating in China need to follow Chinese laws, including those on censorship. Google etc are blocked because they are hosted outside China, and are not willing to cooperate in China. What I find bizarre about the Tiktok ban is that they are being banned essentially on executive whim: as far as I can tell, there are no concrete allegations, much less evidence, that they're violating any US laws.
  - warbaker 6y ago
    So, it's ok for China to ban Google because Google refuses to help with censorship and propaganda, and because Google doesn't want the Chinese govt to be able to spy on its citizens. But it's not OK for the US to keep out spyware. Heck, retaliation for China's banning of Google etc would be sufficient justification for banning TikTok on its own.
    - Dahoon 6y ago
      You cannot say "A" is evil because it does "X", so we will also do "X" and then still claim "A" is evil without saying you are evil yourself. What you are saying is that unless PRC becomes like the US, the US has to become like PRC. I'm amazed how this is not clear to anyone following this. The only way to go forward and not become what you are pointing fingers at is taking the high road. The US is clearly not doing so.
    - Talanes 6y ago
      If we retaliate against every country that has disallowed something that is allowed in America, we're going to run out of imports very quickly.
    - Cthulhu_ 6y ago
      Oh but it is ok, it's just that there's no good legal precedence for it yet. Plus it goes against the US's low restrictions and limitations on doing business.
    - powersnail 6y ago
      It’s obviously not okay for China to ban Google. That’s why China gets criticized for it constantly, by both the west and its own citizens. If US wants to retaliate China by becoming more China, well, surely China isn’t the only one getting hurt.
      - eru 6y ago
        Yes. It's the same situation as 'retaliating' to tariffs with tariffs of your own. It's like butting your head against the wall to teach the other fellow not to but his own head against the wall.
kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
The immediate security issues are more with WeChat but TikTok gives them a social graph of Western youth documenting their foibles. These are all prospects for future moles when they get jobs in sensitive positions.
mrpopo 6y ago
> Going by “national security” reasons most countries should ban Facebook and google, not to mention amazon, Microsoft, oracle, Cisco etc. since the us government has already shown willingness and ability to spy on anything they can get their hands on, including foreign heads of state. Allowing US controlled social media and other tech companies is a huge risk. Yes.
blato 6y ago
> Going by “national security” reasons most countries should ban Facebook and google, not to mention amazon, Microsoft, oracle, Cisco etc. since the us government has already shown willingness and ability to spy on anything they can get their hands on, including foreign heads of state. Allowing US controlled social media and other tech companies is a huge risk. Yes. As a European, I believe in Europe (and in the rest of the world) we should definitively ban most US tech be it for ethical reasons or national security. Same for China. EU Politicians don't seem to understand the situation yet, but given the current technological cold war happening, I hope we'll wake up soon and switch either to open tech or at least to our own local tech.
- warninglights 6y ago
  I think this the key issue against National Security. The US has used its tech to spy on everybody else and and using Trump logic nobody should use it. Free trade is over China's tech could also be used, but I am not a Trump supporter. I would be more afraid of Trump facist controlled NSA backdoors monitoring me than CCP seeing my dance moves

zmmmmm 6y ago

I guess at minimum I'd expect a non-partisan investigation to substantiate that, and then for it to be applied on an equal basis to all companies with similar issues. Some element of the first may have, but I have no awareness of the second part.

bduerst 6y ago

>It's a Chinese company, they have privledges, not rights. Neither Bytedance nor TikTok are Chinese companies. It's true that Bytedance has buildings in Beijing, and a Chinese app (Taotiao) that is a Chinese subsidiary, but Bytedance is a Cayman's Islands company and TikTok doesn't even have servers inside China. For purposes of the Chinese National Intelligence Law compelling the company to share user information with the CCP, Apple shares way more user data than TikTok does.

jjulius 6y ago
>... Bytedance is a Cayman's Islands company... Sure, it's incorporated in the Caymans, but we all know that that is just a technicality.
- Cthulhu_ 6y ago
  Like every other company operating from the Caymans; tax evasion.
  - eru 6y ago
    If you keep everything legal, I think it's called tax optimisation.
unishark 6y ago
Yet somehow the Chinese government can control the export of their technology and needs to approve any deal with a US company? https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/china-unlikely-approve-tiktok-deal-oracle-walmart-state-owned-paper-n1240676 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/china-unlikely-approve-ti...
- eru 6y ago
  Well, the US also controls lots of companies that are not American. Especially in finance. They were handing out American sanctions for European banks doing business with Iranian companies.

ygjb 6y ago

Ok, but how is Tik Tok a national security issue, but the fact that damn near every electronic device available on the market is manufactured in or out of components manufactured in China doesn't seem to be one?

FractalParadigm 6y ago
It actually has been a problem before, in rather recent memory I may add [0]. China is, for all intents and purposes, a bad actor. They keep positioning themselves infinitely closer to "the line" without seemingly ever being able to cross it, even when they're caught red-handed undermining US security. [0] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-10-04/the-big-hack-how-china-used-a-tiny-chip-to-infiltrate-america-s-top-companies https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-10-04/the-big-h...
- wonnage 6y ago
  This is a poor example because it wound up being more about Bloomberg's shoddy reporting https://www.servethehome.com/investigating-implausible-bloomberg-supermicro-stories/ https://www.servethehome.com/investigating-implausible-bloom...
- the-dude 6y ago
  The Big Hack is possible the worst example you could come up with : it is regarded as fabrication, there is no proof whatsoever.
dfischer 6y ago
There’s evidence online, I don’t have it handy but a quick search found this: https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/fxgi06/not_new_news_but_tbh_if_you_have_tiktiok_just_get/?sort=top https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/fxgi06/not_new_news...
- bllguo 6y ago
  seriously? A reddit comment? By the way, they never provided any proof and even better, claimed that their laptop broke when pressed.

mytailorisrich 6y ago

> There's plenty of evidence to the level of dictatorship in China. The political regime of the countries you deal with is not a national security issue in itself, that's not what national security means. Certainly, 'dictatorship' is not a national security issue. Some of the US's "best friends" were, and are, dictatorships.

fit2rule 6y ago

I think Americans should be very, very careful about calling for 'smoking gun evidence' of state oppression, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. It is highly duplicitous to be sabre rattling over perceived ideological differences, when America's own ideology is couched in immensely contradicting - nay, hypocritical - failures to conduct state affairs according to International law. >It's a Chinese company, they have privledges, not rights. This is also true of American companies, especially those with a trillion dollar profit motive in the military-industrial endless-war market. Be very, very careful about what doors you open with statements such as this: >If you want some sort of smoking gun evidence you're not going to find it, unless you somehow have a security clearance in China good enough to gain knowledge about their operations We know all too well how tightly wrapped up in its deep state secrets America's own heinous crimes against humanity are .. and if you are so sure of your own states innocence that you feel warranted in calling for other states' downfall for similar reasons, you must surely be willing to discuss America's own human rights abuses in a similar light. No? Then the moral authority you claim does not exist.

gabaix 6y ago
I don’t read OP has making claims about the US having a higher morale ground. It is pretty accepted no government has the higher morale ground. You can dig enough in any past or present to find evil or good.

vkou 6y ago

Any business with anyone is a national security issue. After all, wreckers, saboteurs, and enemies of the revolution are all around us. Can you prove to me that any company, domestic or otherwise, operating in the US has its national security in mind over shareholder value?