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> "There are real national security risks associated with TikTok, but it’s also an app 150 million Americans use," said Peter Harrell, who served on Biden’s Nat

• chankstein38 3y ago
  The implications, as far as I've understood, is that the Chinese government has access and, theoretically, could be slurping the information that TikTok collects which is seemingly more than some others collect. I'm not purporting to know this is happening but I believe this is the reason for the assertion.
  • lawlessone 3y ago
    Looking at the content there... i don't think they are getting anything good...
    • jayveeone 3y ago
      What content are you looking at? I see amazing artists on there every time I open the app.
    • I_Am_Nous 3y ago
      TikTok is the worst "brain junk food" platform I've seen. Sometimes people forward me videos from TikTok that have some horizontal video at the top (the one you are supposed to watch, apparently?), and then completely unrelated video game footage as the vertical "background". I don't know if it is intended to hook into some sort of attention hack where they abuse the fact that humans are stimulated by movement and color, so a video with a game background is more appealing/attractive than one without, but it's too much stimulus for me to enjoy it. I try to avoid brain junk food most of the time.
      • gardenhedge 3y ago
        It depends on what you look at. The algorithm learns and basically mirrors your interests. Look at crap and it means you're crap. For example I get great gardening tips, DIY videos and learn something every swipe /s I completely agree with you. It's junk! But expect to see my first paragraph as a common rebuttal.
        • thaanpaa 3y ago
          I.e. people who actually use the app are wrong, and you must be right.
          • gardenhedge 3y ago
            I've used the app from an objective point of view. I no longer use the app. I don't think the people promoting it for gardening tips are being objective. The app is _designed_ to keep you scrolling.
      • thaanpaa 3y ago
        My TikTok is filled with electrical engineering, various forms of activism, and so on. I've never seen anything like what you describe, and I've used it a lot. When I first started using it, I noticed a lot of dancing and singing (by very talented people), but those types of videos disappeared quite quickly.
        • I_Am_Nous 3y ago
          It's always difficult for me to not sound like a cranky old man when it comes to social media, because there are good things about social media as a concept, and many good things have been done only because of social media's existence. It's not good for me personally though, so I mostly avoid it. In execution, I really don't like how much it tries to hotwire our brains to scroll endlessly/seek attention so it can sneak ads in between. I also don't like how so much of it is geared toward instant gratification. Will we someday feel the same way about social media that we do about tobacco companies? "People willingly addicting themselves to something for the profit of a corporation" sounds dystopian but we've been here for years...
  • jayveeone 3y ago
    There is zero proof that TikTok collects more user data or uses that data any more nefariously than Meta. US privacy laws are a joke. Singling out TikTok without addressing events like Cambridge Analytica with Facebook, is at best suspicious.
    • thaanpaa 3y ago
      Everyone seems to believe that all the apps spy on users (such as tracking your location, etc.), but I don't believe the platforms actually permit this unless the user expressly grants the app permission. However, just having a huge database of videos, viewing patterns, and social connections to analyze can be absurdly valuable, but I don't see all of that becoming illegal anytime soon.
    • rchaud 3y ago
      > Singling out TikTok without addressing events like Cambridge Analytica with Facebook They have addressed it, with the single largest FTC fine in history. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2019/07/ftc-imposes-5-billion-penalty-sweeping-new-privacy-restrictions-facebook https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2019/07/...
      • jayveeone 3y ago
        I'm in awe that you linked to the FTC fine as evidence of our government taking action to protect our user data.
      • asadotzler 3y ago
        How is 7% of that one year's revenue meaningful? Facebook could pay that every year and still be extremely lucrative. So, no, it has not been addressed.
        • rchaud 3y ago
          This is America, fines are how everything is addressed. Deepwater Horizon, Exxon Valdez, Facebook, you name it. We don't haul CEOs off to jail in this country.
  • throw__away7391 3y ago
    I always thought that the opposite was the main concern, pushing a narrative rather than collecting data. I don’t know if it is, but it would be mine. For example, I have seen many videos clearly aimed at young people that casually and weirdly slip in a comment stating that Taiwan is part of China. One example: one of these “a guy asking pretty girls trivia questions” asks two girls a series of questions, to one question she says Taiwan to which says “Taiwan is part of China” in a mocking voice and the other girl laughs at her. Another example: a guy giving statistics about private jet ownership randomly mentioning the number of planes “in China, including Taiwan and Hong Kong”. These all appear to be made by Americans, filmed in LA or Miami, but are clearly either some sort of deliberate attempt to influence public opinion or content creators trying to get their videos promoted by including such comments.
    • Hizonner 3y ago
      That does sound like the tone of Chinese propaganda. I mean, when they think they're being subtle. They are so bad at it. I would hope that kind of thing would be pretty cringeworthily crude and obvious to any teenager raised on a diet of Western advertising. Maybe I'm overoptimistic, though.
    • kelseyfrog 3y ago
      This has "we don't have propaganda - we have truth," and "they don't have truth - they have propaganda" vibes to it. I'm frankly tired of being patronized. If the US wants to propagandize to people at least just admit it. At least one side is truthful about it.
      • usernomdeguerre 3y ago
        If we agree that both parties propagandize we should also recognize that they may do so to different ends, no?
        • kelseyfrog 3y ago
          Yep, and as someone on the receiving end, one can choose to defect as a bargaining tactic.
• nonameiguess 3y ago
  I think people on Hacker News seem to commonly mistake threats to their personal privacy with threats to national security. Facebook having to turn over data to the American government can't be a threat to American national security. This isn't to say the threat to you as a person is any different compared to TikTok handing over data to the CCP, but the concern here is maintaining American strategic military and intelligence advantage, not being fair and allowing all governments equal access to personal data.
  • coldpie 3y ago
    Okay, but like, spell it out for me. What are the risks?
    • labcomputer 3y ago
      0. One thing that three letter agencies like to do when posting an intelligence officer to a foreign country is to give them a false identity. Platforms like TikTok make reidentification much easier, which blows their cover. What makes this especially insidious is that this data goes back to childhood, before anyone is thinking about a career in intelligence. 1. Tiktok can identify people (in the US, in the government or military) who are in key strategic positions. For example, people with access to interesting information, or who know a lot of people with access to information. 2. Among the group in #1, it can identify people who are vulnerable to recruitment as spies. For example, it can identify any taboo tastes they might have, which are not (necessarily) illegal, but can be used as leverage to recruit a spy. Or identify people with financial problems (another vector for spy recruitment). Or people who are lonely, who would fall for a honey trap, etc. 3. It can spread propaganda I. What happens if the chain of command breaks because someone thinks a war is illegitimate because they've been brainwashed? If Taiwan is and always has been the rightful territory of China, and nearly 100% of Taiwanese and mainland Chinese want them to be united, then why are we fighting a war to keep them apart? 4. It can spread propaganda II. Trade wars are not without downsides. One of them is that it makes imports from China more expensive. Propaganda does not need to be false information. What happens if the public broadly loses support for the trade war because of TikTok propaganda? 5. Remote no-click zero-days for iPhone exist. China has a capable cyber intelligence service. TikTok could be used to spread an exploit to phones of people in key strategic roles.
• mschuster91 3y ago
  > It would be nice if anyone explained what those risks are, and why they don't apply to Facebook et al. First of all, any company operating out of China can be assumed to be under more or less direct control of the CCP. When the Party comes knocking, there is no non-compliance to whatever they want. That alone is more than enough reason to be more skeptical of anything China. (Yes, I'm aware of FISA, but that's nowhere near comparable to having Party members on your board) The second difference/risk comes with looking whom these apps target: kids. Basically, whoever controls the algorithm that ranks what content kids watch, has a very effective way of mind control... kids are sponges, they soak up whatever they see, and especially compared to the old radio/TV era, a lot of what's available on the Internet is pretty dangerous and not vetted by anyone. Be it all kinds of dangerous "challenges", Incel/Gamergate/far-right propaganda, hate against LGBT or whatever - it's all completely intransparent. That's bad enough if done by Western companies for profit reasons, but even worse as a capability in the hands of an enemy nation.
  • coldpie 3y ago
    If we agree that that's bad, why do we allow Facebook to do it? Why not craft a ban on the bad behavior, which would then necessarily also preclude Tiktok from doing it?
    • kibwen 3y ago
      Sure, let's do it. I haven't seen anyone defending Facebook's own shitty behavior here. If you mean why don't politicians do it, the answer is corruption (lobbying).
    • gardenhedge 3y ago
      Because the US government has more authority over Facebook than it does for a Chinese tech company.
      • coldpie 3y ago
        I don't understand how. If Facebook or Tiktok('s US branch) violates some law against whatever bad behavior, we can punish them or shut them down. If we don't have such a law, then by definition we have no control over it. What is the difference?
• jncfhnb 3y ago
  How would you feel if China offered Americans $5 to vote for the candidate of their choice? Or paid people to speak on that candidates behalf without disclosing it as advertising? Or paid twitter to hide certain topics while promoting certain topics without classifying them as ads or promoted? Or if they were social media and just started lying to you about your social circle’s public opinion?
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  • coldpie 3y ago
    How would you feel about Facebook doing any of that?
    • jncfhnb 3y ago
      I would feel very bad, but I would also expect a whistleblower to intervene “eventually”. Many of these things are explicitly illegal. And it would be kind of shocking for executive leadership at Facebook to decide this was worth the risk. YMMV for different scales of influence. I don’t trust Facebook at all. But they’re not an antagonistic nation state.
• Clubber 3y ago
  There is a theory that the government is doing this to stifle competition for US companies. It's certainly not out of character, but there could be other reasons as well.
• paulddraper 3y ago
  > what those risks are, and why they don't apply to Facebook et al Facebook et all aren't subject to CCP control.