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It is even harder to take the accusations seriously, given that she made factually provably wrong statements that contradict the reality (and the original artic

It is even harder to take the accusations seriously, given that she made factually provably wrong statements that contradict the reality (and the original article in the OP actually contrasted those very plainly and directly, gotta commend good journalism there). > Wynn-Willias told senators that Meta built a “physical pipeline connecting the United States and China” and executives “ignored warnings that this would provide backdoor access to the Chinese Communist Party, allowing them to intercept the personal data and private messages of American citizens.” > She said that China does not currently have access to U.S. user data only because Congress “stepped in.” > The pipeline to China mentioned by the whistleblower, the Pacific Light Cable, was never completed. > The cable, which was first announced in 2016 with support from Facebook, Google and other companies, was envisioned as a high-capacity fiberoptic undersea cable running thousands of miles under the Pacific Ocean connecting Los Angeles and Hong Kong. > Bloomberg reported in 2020 that Facebook, Google and other companies abandoned their plans to link the U.S. to Hong Kong. They revised their proposal to build the link only as far as Taiwan and the Philippines, according to Bloomberg. Real talk, I have zero idea how she could explain this one away, other than with “it came to me in a dream.”

hluska 2y ago
[flagged]
MeetingsBrowser 2y ago
This is mentioned in her book. In the book she says Meta wanted to build the pipeline, despite the warnings. But yes, ultimately the construction fell through. She is not claiming the pipeline exists today.
- filoleg 2y ago
  I am really curious to hear what evidence there is of that high-capacity fiberoptic undersea cable connecting LA to Hong-Kong (being worked on by many companies like Google/Meta/etc.) ever having any plans of being used as a “backdoor” for China to intercept all the user data. Either there is some massive grand conspiracy going on between all those different companies (a good number of which have exactly zero products or revenue or business presence in China) and the Chinese government or, which I am leaning more towards given the claims, this is all just oversensationalized lies. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and so far we only got the “bush did 9/11” level of evidence for claims that are arguably even more wild and convoluted than that. The author, for example, also claims that “yeah, this was all according to the plan, until congress stepped in to stop the fiberoptic cable due to those concerns.” Any record of congress doing that for those reasons? What about existing fiberoptic cables going through China right now? Are those cables not as special or useful for that purpose? Why not? I am not even defending China and their approaches. I am familiar with deep packet traffic inspection and other things of a similar nature their government does. But that’s not a blanket excuse to just claim wild massive multinational conspiracies involving so many actors, all without as much as even good reason for why it would even make sense for them all to cooperate.
  - maxglute 2y ago
    > Any record of congress doing that for those reasons I think it was part of Clean Networks Initiative, there's ongoing strategic game to cut PRC out of subsea infra business, just like telcom. IIRC a bunch of sanctions a few years ago killed many cable projects or at least pushed PRC out as partner. Cables landing in PRC didn't. Cables landing in ASEAN but with PRC suppliers/builders ended up switching to other suppliers/builders.
    - filoleg 2y ago
      Those reasons you mentioned make perfect logical sense to me, and are exactly what I saw myself. None of those reasons have anything to do with the congress stepping-in due to the concerns of Meta/Google/etc. conspiring with PRC, to provide them a dedicated backdoor access to american user data.
- maxglute 2y ago
  >ultimately the construction fell through It was part of the ongoing subsea cable wars, US wanted to squeeze PRC from subsea infra game a few years ago and sanctioned a bunch of PRC companies which disrupted projects.

hluska 2y ago

[flagged]

MeetingsBrowser 2y ago

This is mentioned in her book. In the book she says Meta wanted to build the pipeline, despite the warnings. But yes, ultimately the construction fell through. She is not claiming the pipeline exists today.

filoleg 2y ago
I am really curious to hear what evidence there is of that high-capacity fiberoptic undersea cable connecting LA to Hong-Kong (being worked on by many companies like Google/Meta/etc.) ever having any plans of being used as a “backdoor” for China to intercept all the user data. Either there is some massive grand conspiracy going on between all those different companies (a good number of which have exactly zero products or revenue or business presence in China) and the Chinese government or, which I am leaning more towards given the claims, this is all just oversensationalized lies. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and so far we only got the “bush did 9/11” level of evidence for claims that are arguably even more wild and convoluted than that. The author, for example, also claims that “yeah, this was all according to the plan, until congress stepped in to stop the fiberoptic cable due to those concerns.” Any record of congress doing that for those reasons? What about existing fiberoptic cables going through China right now? Are those cables not as special or useful for that purpose? Why not? I am not even defending China and their approaches. I am familiar with deep packet traffic inspection and other things of a similar nature their government does. But that’s not a blanket excuse to just claim wild massive multinational conspiracies involving so many actors, all without as much as even good reason for why it would even make sense for them all to cooperate.
- maxglute 2y ago
  > Any record of congress doing that for those reasons I think it was part of Clean Networks Initiative, there's ongoing strategic game to cut PRC out of subsea infra business, just like telcom. IIRC a bunch of sanctions a few years ago killed many cable projects or at least pushed PRC out as partner. Cables landing in PRC didn't. Cables landing in ASEAN but with PRC suppliers/builders ended up switching to other suppliers/builders.
  - filoleg 2y ago
    Those reasons you mentioned make perfect logical sense to me, and are exactly what I saw myself. None of those reasons have anything to do with the congress stepping-in due to the concerns of Meta/Google/etc. conspiring with PRC, to provide them a dedicated backdoor access to american user data.
maxglute 2y ago
>ultimately the construction fell through It was part of the ongoing subsea cable wars, US wanted to squeeze PRC from subsea infra game a few years ago and sanctioned a bunch of PRC companies which disrupted projects.