TikTok has been at the center of controversy for the United States government in the last few years. Particularly, members of the Senate believe China-based parent company ByteDance could spy on its users and share information with the Chinese Government.
With fears that TikTok could shut down if new legislation passes Congress, with lawmakers pushing for the website’s sale, ex-Activision CEO Bobby Kotick is reportedly looking to purchase the platform.
It’s not a “could spy”, it’s a definitely spies. Yes, it sucks that we don’t have broader social media reforms and controls in place, but allowing a foreign hostile government this much direct access to US citizens is a bridge too far.
Then maybe this should be the time to curtail all social media apps from being able to spy on users. But no they won’t do that cause the US government uses that data for itself happily. So instead they make legislation that allows them to broadly target any social media app they mark as “controlled by a hostile foreign power”. Which just sounds like a way for them to target any social media app that isn’t US based and that they can’t control in some way. I don’t like TikTok and I think it should be forced to stop spying or be banned, but the same standard should be applied to all websites, apps, etc.
I partially agree: you’re right that the Chinese government spying on American users is unacceptable, but you’re wrong about it being any worse than the US government doing it.
Only case would be if you work in government, but even then, it’d only be a problem if you’re using an unsecured device that also has Tiktok on it to do secret government stuff on, which would probably get you super-fired and possibly prosecuted in itself…
Ah the good old days, where here in Blitey that would have been the case.
These days that kind of thing gets you promoted to Minister for Digital Communications or even just Prime Minister.
I kid you not.
“It also emerged that all messages on Boris Johnson’s phone were wiped in April 2021, after it emerged his number had been freely available on the internet for 15 years.”
Well, if you look at that argument from the US government perspective, a US company vs a China one certainly warrants a different approach. I mean, I wish we had broader social media level data protections, but that’s not what this is no matter what spin is being applied.
From a personal point of view aren’t I better off if a foreign government spies on me rather than a local one?
Like China isn’t going to fine me for piracy or jail me for protesting. My country could.