[HN Gopher] ByteDance confirmed it used TikTok to monitor journa... ___________________________________________________________________ ByteDance confirmed it used TikTok to monitor journalists' physical location Author : alphabetting Score : 302 points Date : 2022-12-22 20:22 UTC (2 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www.forbes.com) (TXT) w3m dump (www.forbes.com) | AbrahamParangi wrote: | A bit of meta commentary but I've noticed in recent years a | phenomenon where people will adamantly defend something _because | they associate attacking it with their political opponents_. | | You see this very clearly in the conservative response to US | support of Ukraine. You'd expect to see more conservative support | for simultaneously defending a free people while also destroying | a primary adversary for pennies on the dollar but instead you see | a lot of skepticism _because the Democrats are all over | supporting it_. | | I also see a similar phenomenon with TikTok, where I think some | people defend it principally because banning TikTok was "a Trump | thing" and more generally China-hawkishness is viewed as "a | Republican thing". | kranke155 wrote: | Yeah. Ban TikTok, have an American company make a clone. | | Why is this insanity allowed ? China doesn't allow Western social | networks. Why do we allow our strategic enemy to have software on | our phones? End this madness. Stop the sale of Chinese tech in | the West, period. It's all backdoored. | | (if you think they are interested in "co-living" go talk to the | Kremlin on how that went. China is bidding its time but their | intention is to end US dominance. They tell us this and they | release papers on how they intend to do it. If you think that's | ok, great. I don't see how a democratic rule of law country, | flaws as it may have, being replaced by a brutal dictatorship, is | a good option). | ironSkillet wrote: | Agreed...I don't understand why this isn't an obvious thing all | of congress would get behind. Change the law if necessary. | woodruffw wrote: | Because the statutory (not to mention constitutional) | implications are staggering: what about our government's | structure do you think gives it the authority to outright ban | social media companies? Do you _want_ it to have that power, | or do you just want to government to casuistically ban the | things you think should be banned? | | Note: this is entirely independent from whether TikTok is | bad, which I'm more confident than not it is. But contorting | our already contorted national security laws around it is not | a tenable solution. | gjsman-1000 wrote: | "Do you want it to have that power" | | What an odd question. The government bans things all the | time - can you go and buy unpasteurized milk right now? Or | walk into a weapons store and buy brass knuckles? But | heaven forbid, we're abandoning our principles if we ban a | data collection platform owned and operated by a genocidal | undemocratic government. | woodruffw wrote: | Of course the government bans things all the time. The | question is of kind: unpasteurized milk and brass | knuckles exist in regulatory environments that don't | meaningfully impinge upon civil liberties. | | It's not even clear what statute you'd use to "ban" | TikTok. Is it a national security risk? | shrewduser wrote: | it is a national risk but i imagine there's also economic | / trade grounds in the fact that china doesn't let | american companies compete in their market. | | I don't see any reason for it not to be in the purview of | government. | woodruffw wrote: | It is in the purview of the government. That's not the | question; the statutory justification for a _ban_ is the | question. | | Every single country on this planet of ours engages in | some form of protectionism, whether we like it or not: | again, it isn't clear what casuistic justification | explains singling out China's protectionism, and even | then banning _just one_ company involved in it. Italy | doesn 't let us sell the sawdust we call "Parmesan," but | I'd prefer it if we didn't ban selling the real thing in | retaliation. | | Finally, for the national risk: what, _precisely_ is the | national risk? You can argue (correctly!) that they 're a | bad actor given this news, and I would be _more than | happy_ to see those involved in the surveillance of | journalists see the inside of a court. But this doesn 't | even come _close_ to meeting the standard for a national | security risk, weak as that standard has become. | [deleted] | mannerheim wrote: | You don't need to ban it. Just forbid US companies from | doing business with TikTok, and their users will plummet | when they can't pay for CDNs in America. | woodruffw wrote: | Thanks for actually answering the question! | | Frankly, I wouldn't mind if this happens. I just wish we | wouldn't swing "national security" around as the cudgel. | LarryMullins wrote: | The Constitution plainly gives Congress the power and right | to regulate international trade. | woodruffw wrote: | Yes. What isn't clear is whether that statutory authority | even _approaches_ being empowered to ban companies that | figure centrally in public expression. | pesfandiar wrote: | It seems we're sliding into a new cold war, but the US is | still contemplating its strategy. Banning a vastly successful | social media outright needs to be aligned with that strategy, | and not to mention how unpopular taking away an addictive app | would be with the voters. | natelegler wrote: | 100% this. | Xeoncross wrote: | It's not even tikTok really, it's WeChat or any other CCP | monitored social media company. | | I'd love to have a tikTok not controlled by the CCP (or KGB for | that matter). | | You know, a platform where saying something against the | government doesn't result in prison time or death. | Adraghast wrote: | The KGB has not existed for decades. If you're going to make | inflammatory statements, you should make sure you're talking | about the correct things. | gjsman-1000 wrote: | Well this is naive - the KGB lives on with the same agents, | same files, same buildings, same crimes - it's just now | called the FSB. | Adraghast wrote: | Perhaps you thought me under the impression Russia hasn't | had a state security service since the USSR collapsed, | but obviously I know that. The point is that one can | better cloak the warmed over Cold War paranoia they're | peddling under the guise of knowing what they're talking | about if they avoid warmed over Cold War terminology. | LarryMullins wrote: | For my part, I still insist on calling British soldiers | "red coats". | mannerheim wrote: | Is it Cold War paranoia when Russia is currently engaged | in the invasion of another country? | LarryMullins wrote: | It sure smells like it when you're using terminology | outdated by 30 years. Don't use anachronisms if you don't | want people to think you're anachronistic. | | You may as well call Russians "Soviets". Yes, it's many | of the same people in the same buildings, doing the same | sort of bullshit. But they aren't called Soviets anymore | and if you go around calling them Soviets, you'll going | to have people think that you're stuck in the 80s. | mannerheim wrote: | Do you insist people refer to the company who Mark | Zuckerberg is CEO of as Meta? And correct people who | speak of 'Google stock'? | LarryMullins wrote: | Broken analogy; "Facebook" still exists and their CEO is | still Mark Zuckerberg; the fact that Facebook is now | owned by Meta hasn't changed this; the name "Facebook" | was not discontinued. "Google stock" _is_ an anarchonism, | but at least "Google" still exists. | | The KGB doesn't exist anymore. They are now the FSB. The | "KGB" still exists in the same sense that "The Soviets" | still exist, neither call themselves that anymore, nor do | they have any subsidiaries called that. | mannerheim wrote: | Belarusian intelligence is still the KGB | LarryMullins wrote: | Personally I'm a lot more concerned about the FSB, but | you do you. | mannerheim wrote: | Just a correction on the KGB not existing anymore. | mannerheim wrote: | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Security_Committee_of_t | h... | Adraghast wrote: | https://101kgb.iheart.com/ | mannerheim wrote: | Belarusian KGB is the same organisation. | shrewduser wrote: | i mean only technically in name only. | [deleted] | bioemerl wrote: | The KGB has not existed for decades, but its spiritual | successor, Russia, is almost certainly still performing spy | operations and generally you can assume when someone says | KGB they mean Russian spies. | partiallypro wrote: | I actually liked the Trump method, which was to force them to | sell the US arm to a US company and sever it from the Chinese. | I don't know why that never came to fruition; it looked like it | was nearly a done deal (Microsoft was the leading bidder.) | Making a competitor from scratch would just open up the | userbase to another state actor, though it could give a window | for a Vine return. | Bud wrote: | Except that this story reveals the obvious reason this | wouldn't work. How do you reliably keep that US "arm" from | being co-opted? How do you make sure that the software isn't | phoning home to China regardless of what the US arm does? | | Oracle and Walmart reportedly at that time brokered a deal to | run the US arm of TikTok. Do you trust them? Walmart | certainly isn't politically neutral, by any stretch. | Meanwhile, Larry Ellison was a leading figure in the effort | to subvert the 2020 election. He was on the Nov. 14 election | subversion planning call, along with "Sen. Lindsey O. Graham | (R-S.C.); Fox News host Sean Hannity; Jay Sekulow, an | attorney for President Donald Trump; and James Bopp Jr., an | attorney for True the Vote, a Texas-based nonprofit that has | promoted disputed claims of widespread voter fraud." (source: | WaPo) | | This doesn't seem like a solid plan, to put it rather mildly. | LarryMullins wrote: | The US Government already trusts Oracle Corp with much more | than merely a social media application. | | https://www.oracle.com/industries/government/us-defense/ | | Larry Ellison defecting to China doesn't seem like a likely | scenario, I don't think he'd like life as an international | fugitive, slave to a host with a history of treating their | own native billionaires harshly. Barring such a flight, the | US Government can get their hands on him if that becomes | necessary, but I doubt it will. | idontpost wrote: | [dead] | mannerheim wrote: | Activist judge blocked the sanctions on TikTok. | bayindirh wrote: | When US bans something to protect itself, that's OK, but when | another country does it, it's a suppression of free speech and | freedoms and whatnot. | | Doesn't this sound a bit _off_? | kranke155 wrote: | We're not in the world of what ifs and ethical debates. | | We are in a world where our strategic enemy has a foothold on | our digital lives and will likely use it against us. This is | evidence. We should treat our enemies as enemies. China | doesn't consider itself to be in a friendly competition for | dominance. Neither should we. | 8note wrote: | We're in a world where Facebook has already used it's power | to influence who wins western elections. | | The enemy was here before TikTok has existed, china is | catching up quickly to the western tools for dominance | eldritch_4ier wrote: | Good things are good, evil things are evil. | | This detached observer way of looking at the world is mind | boggling. There is nothing contradictory about arguing for | the good and arguing against the evil. I think this mindset | stems from a fundamental uncertainty in our values, and | conclude that our values are just as good as any others. It's | simply not true. | | No. TikTok is run by a state hostile to the ideals of freedom | and our western way of life. That alone is enough of an | argument for banning it: because of values are good, and we | don't want their values. If they are not willing to go above | and beyond to demonstrate they will do the same, then ban it. | They are not entitled to our attention, our children's | attention, or any of our other resources. | mardifoufs wrote: | Your comment only makes sense since you are an american. | The entire premise of your argument completely false a part | when you have actually experienced what the "goodness" of | america, say in the middle east, means. | lmm wrote: | The idea that US is good and China is evil is absurd. Other | Americans do far more to destroy "ideals of freedom and our | western way of life" than China does - hell, I'm pretty | sure that with the current US polarisation, both sides | would say they have more in common with China than with | their US opponents - and they'd be right. Take any concept | of "freedom" or "way of life" that you care for, and half | the US is currently against it. TikTok is a bogeyman that | has done nothing to Americans that Americans weren't | already doing to themselves. | idontpost wrote: | [dead] | adamsmith143 wrote: | Intent matters. The reason why China bans foreign social | media is much different than the reason we would want to ban | TikTok. | medellin wrote: | Little different when the CCP is ok the board of the company | and controls its decisions. Look at what happened to Didi | when they did one thing without consent from them. I don't | think you are comparing the same things. | bioemerl wrote: | Does anyone consider the EU passing all sorts of data privacy | laws and putting regulations on American companies as | censorship? | | No, just regular protectionism and it doesn't get too much | flack. | | The problem with China is that they are actually suppressing | free speech and freedoms and whatnot. Do you disagree that | this is the case? | imperfect_blue wrote: | Tit-for-tat makes perfect sense from a game theory point of | view, even ignoring the egregious abuse of data for nefarious | purposes by the CCP. | LarryMullins wrote: | US soldiers used rifles. Nazi soldiers also used rifles. Oh | the hypocrisy! | | Give me a break. | acchow wrote: | If China decided to ban a US company for using its app to | locate Chinese citizens, I'd say that is totally fair. | kranke155 wrote: | China has banned all western social media I think? | FpUser wrote: | >"China doesn't allow Western social networks. Why do we allow | our strategic enemy to have software on our phones?" | | I agree with this. Things should be reciprocal. I do not think | China is the enemy though. More like a strategic competitor. | Trading with the enemy is a crime, right? | | >"(if you think they are interested in "co-living" go talk to | the Kremlin on how that went" | | Why do you equate China with Kremlin? I think China is way | smarter and has managed huge economical achievements while | Putin is pissing away immense potential that Russia has. If we | talk about co-living it is the US that after WWII was attacking | and wrecking numerous countries killing directly and indirectly | millions. China so far has harassed its own population only and | has yet to do anything even remotely approaching what the US | has done on international scale. | | >"China is bidding its time but their intention is to end US | dominance." | | Now here comes the real reason. The US dominance - you sure | this is what the rest of the world wants? How about we try | without subservients to a single country. | | >"I don't see how a democratic rule of law country, flaws as it | may have, being replaced by a brutal dictatorship, is a good | option" | | Nobody wants that. But it is the US (and allies) that keeps | taking away more rights and freedoms. If you compare for | example 90s and now people look more and more like cattle. You | can't blame China for that. I think somebody else is | responsible. | TaylorAlexander wrote: | To me this doesn't really address the bigger picture. Why is | this tracking even possible? Why don't we build better security | in to our products? Is it because US companies built their | business on this same type of tracking? Perhaps that's the | issue we should fix. | jacquesm wrote: | > Why do we allow our strategic enemy to have software on our | phones? | | They _make_ the phones. What makes you trust the hardware in | the first place? | not2b wrote: | They assemble the phones would be more accurate; most of the | chips are manufactured elsewhere. | kranke155 wrote: | That's exactly my point. Apple moving some production to | India (or so I read) is a good first step. Western production | moved to China due to Chinese strategic efforts to locate our | industrial production there. We should have our own strategic | effort of our own to reverse that. | DiogenesKynikos wrote: | This is rewriting history. | | Production moved to China because China began allowing | foreign investment, and Chinese labor was cheaper. Foreign | companies made their own decisions to take advantage of | cheap Chinese labor. | | This wasn't some sort of nefarious Chinese plot. The US | also wanted China to open up to American investment. | kranke155 wrote: | China made a large effort to woo western companies to | manufacture there. Afaik they built special economic | zones, it was a deliberate effort by the govt. If it all | happened by accident then why didn't manufacturing move | to India? Both China and India moved to the GATT at the | same time afaik. | lmm wrote: | Manufacturing didn't move to India largely because their | quality wasn't good enough. There's no need to make it | more complicated than that. | h4x0rr wrote: | I mean can you really call it democratic when there are only | two parties and the citizens have basically no power? | https://youtu.be/U6w9CbemhVY | treeman79 wrote: | Bribes, lots of bribes. | | Trump called for Tik Tok to be banned. He was mocked for it. | kranke155 wrote: | Fine great let's just agree Trump got it right and end this. | h4x0rr wrote: | I mean there are already two american tiktok clones: insta | reels and YouTube shorts | kranke155 wrote: | Great. Then kill it, then kill any company with Chinese | origin that won't open source it's hardware and software to | the US Government. | HDThoreaun wrote: | The American clones are garbage. The problem with | protectionism is it leads to less competition and therefore | worse products. If you want apps to stop tracking people | just make it illegal for apps to tracks people. Country of | origin is irrelelvant. | SoylentYellow wrote: | > Country of origin is irrelelvant. | | Country of origin is still very relevant. China has | National Security Laws that compel companies and citizens | to provide access to and actively help their intelligence | agencies. The CCP right now can lawfully order TikTok to | push a version with a backdoor and then gaslight the US | about its existence if found, e.g. oh that was just an | innocent software bug. Or to secretly provide user data | and lie about providing it. | not2b wrote: | But the business models of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, | and Google Search are all based on tracking people. | h4x0rr wrote: | I aggree, it's a much more pragmatic solution. But do you | really think the CCP would follow this rule? | DiogenesKynikos wrote: | The CCP doesn't have anything to do with it. TikTok would | have to follow the rule, just like any other company. | h4x0rr wrote: | CCP is part of bytedance and it's more than likely | they'll follow government requests. The OP was about | journalists, not regular users mind you. | Sebguer wrote: | How is this different from Uber's god view? | [deleted] | zug_zug wrote: | I feel like this is talking out of both sides of the mouth. | | If _the issue_ is that corporations aren 't following data | privacy laws, build the privacy into the tool at the | software/ecosystem level (e.g make signup without true name / | phone number / IMEI a legal requirement, signup without location | sharing a legal requirement) then it'll be impossible to track | journalists for both Chinese and American companies. | Xeoncross wrote: | Forget corporations, I'm concerned about what the governments | are doing with this data to harm people (especially those under | their own jurisdictions). | | ByteDance isn't the problem, the CCP controlling it is. | mrtweetyhack wrote: | [dead] | sneak wrote: | Companies use phone number for signup because phone numbers | cost money, and it serves as a proxy to allow companies to | generally avoid having people make hundreds of thousands of | burner accounts. | bioemerl wrote: | We should do both. | | This is detracting from the fact that we have an actively | hostile actor with a huge platform here in our country, and | that needs to be handled as soon as possible. | | I totally support broad regulation of privacy law. TikTok is a | much deeper concern. I don't like seeing a good cause used to | distract from another good cause. | nonethewiser wrote: | > This is detracting from the fact that we have an actively | hostile actor with a huge platform here in our country, and | that needs to be handled as soon as possible. | | Can you clarify what you mean here? I realize people are | unhappy with how Elon has run Twitter but who do you expect | to do what? | 8note wrote: | We should do the one because it covers both cases. | | A TikTok that doesn't have the ability to do bad things isn't | an issue. Focusing on TikTok pretends that it's the only | hostile actor with a large platform in <country> that needs | to be handled asap | | You can handle Facebook and TikTok at the same time by | putting in strong privacy regulations, along with all the | other similar hostile actors | bioemerl wrote: | I'm very skeptical that there is such a thing as a | regulation which can keep a state actor with zero | transparency like TikTok in check. | | Even if you move all of their code and mandate that they | have a shell company in the United States, and you mandate | that none of American data ever goes to China, they can | ignore you. You validate that every request only stays in | the United States? How do you validate that there's no | communication between the two systems? | | The state they operate in is going to make whistle blowing | very difficult, not ever allow proper auditing into the | state apparatus which ultimately controls the company. | | You can administrate code, but unless you actually build | that code yourself and basically understand it from the | ground up with every single update, which is going to be | nearly impossible, it's going to be very easy to sneak | features through. | | The problem is, keeping this safe is going to be a herculan | task, and we're just not up to it. Facebook is tame in | comparison, because at the end of the day they're subject | to our open media, transparency laws, corporate auditing, | and all of that other fun stuff. | | We can reasonably pass regulations that help keep Facebook | in check. | | We cannot reasonably pass regulations which we'll keep | TikTok in check. | dieortin wrote: | Tiktok isn't only dangerous because of the data they | harvest. It's the epitome of algorithmic social media, | which can be extremely damaging to society, and also a tool | for propaganda and disinformation. | shrewduser wrote: | personally despite all that, it seems weird that western | social network / tech companies aren't able to operate in | china but the reverse is fine. | siggen wrote: | Mainly due to different government systems/markets. Each | nation applies certain rules to protect interests and | favored companies. An article that described some is here | [1]. | | [1] https://time.com/6139988/countries-where-twitter- | facebook-ti... | renonn wrote: | [dead] | 8note wrote: | The west values free enterprise, association, etc. China | does not. | | If you want to be more like china, you can ban them, but if | you think that freedom is valuable, it's you who's losing | out | kmonsen wrote: | Or you can have a group of countries that mostly | cooperates and leave out the ones that only take and | never give. | shrewduser wrote: | The west doesn't just give everyone unlimited market | access, especially if it's not reciprocated. | [deleted] | paiute wrote: | same with land ownership. | phpisthebest wrote: | I often wonder why the average american should be more | concerned about China than the CIA or FBI? | | the FBI has the power to put me in a cage, China does not... | I am confused as why china is a bigger threat to me | personally than the FBI? | nonethewiser wrote: | How about both | ipaddr wrote: | The average person would never come in contact with the fbi | or be put in a cage randomly. Ask your neighbours / friends | if they have heard about anyone in their circle who had | this happen to them in some form. | | That fear is from tv using it so often it seems true. | | What does the average American need to fear about China? | Very little in terms of impact to daily lives. | | What does the average American need to fear about being | secretly recorded by a neighbour? Very little.. they still | think its creepy | jfengel wrote: | The FBI has that power, but at least in theory they don't | want to. That's the balance we strike with government: we | give them the monopoly on the legitimate use of force, in | exchange for some kind of believe that they won't mis-use | that force. | | The FBI has at least some kind of supervision, from elected | officials who ultimately answer to their constituents. | That's a long way from a guarantee, but it's more than | nothing, which is what you have on China. | | China can't (legitimately) put you in a cage, but they can | do a lot of other things to make you really unhappy, and | there's nothing you can do about it. Whether that nets out | to be more or less scary is up to you, but there is a | difference on which to make the distinction. | | Me, I'm not really so sure that this app represents all | that big a threat compared to all of the other things. My | concerns are more with the intermediate: large corporations | without the power to put me in a cage but with the power to | do a lot of other bad things. Including just plain losing | my info by accident, something neither the FBI nor China is | likely to do. | hollerith wrote: | The FBI and CIA have both good and bad effects on a US | resident whereas China's national security establishment | has only bad effects (if it has any significant effects). | | There is no disadvantage to a US resident from stopping | them from spying on US residents. | bioemerl wrote: | Depends hugely on who you are and what happens with the | politics. | | CIA and FBI are very big threats to you, which is why you | vote regularly to ensure that your rights are represented | and those agencies aren't able to abuse their power. | | China is a much more distant and abstract, but much more | serious threat. | | If the FBI or CIA fucks up, they will put let's say 10% of | people in prison for opposition to the state. | | If China is allowed to gain upper hands on the United | States, it will result in broad scale societal problems | which I couldn't even begin to estimate. Imagine a world | where Russia is allowed to take Europe. Imagine a world | where the United States is convinced to stand by as Taiwan | is invaded and our chip supply is shut down. | | They are very different threats, and should be treated very | differently. The FBI and CIA are immune system type | systems, where China is a guy with a knife. | | The CIA and FBI have checks on them and are balanced as we | speak. China is a fully rogue actor with no balancing | systems to prevent it from damaging our society. | | Both can kill you, both will kill you if given the | opportunity. You shouldn't worry not about the guy with a | knife because your immune system can kill you in 5 minutes | if it wanted to. You should worry about both. | phpisthebest wrote: | >>which is why you vote regularly to ensure that your | rights are represented and those agencies aren't able to | abuse their power | | That never works out in practice as the administrative | state (which includes the FBI and CIA) are soo far | removed from representative government they are basically | unaccountable at this point, that is with out even | getting into the idea that 1 vote in a nation of 350 | million plus holds no real power anyway, or the problems | with First past the post, or countless other topics | around voting | | "Democracy" is more or less an delusion those in power | perpetuate to ensure the cattle think they have a choice | | >>Imagine a world where the United States is convinced to | stand by as Taiwan is invaded | | I think we already live in such a world. | | >>The CIA and FBI have checks on them and are balanced as | we speak. | | Do they? In any real sense? We have confirmed and rumored | massive violations of constitutional rights both here and | abroad yet there is no accountability. From the Torture | report, to massive violation of 4th amendment via | "parallel construction" to even the possibility of actual | assassinations.. | | Who exactly are they accountable to? it is certainly not | the people, or the constitution | andrepd wrote: | >possibility of actual assassinations | | There are _documented_ examples of FBI killings of | dissident citizens (e.g. Fred Hampton). This is not even | a "possibility". | bioemerl wrote: | > "Democracy" is more or less an delusion those in power | perpetuate to ensure the cattle think they have a choice | | I had a much larger post, but I'm going to only respond | to this one now, because it sums up basically off the | disagreements and no further discussion is going to | resolve anything. | | I don't agree with this sort of cynicism at all, and I | very much do believe that while it is very flawed, | democracy ultimately is still doing its job. | phpisthebest wrote: | I understand the resistance cynicism, however your | statement about democracy seems to be more faith based | than any kind of data | | What data do you have to support the position that | "democracy ultimately is still doing its job. " further | what "job" do you believe democracy is doing. | | I can point to many data points that show it is not, the | for mentioned lack of accountability. The fact that most | of the voting population does not even vote. I can point | to research studies like that from political scientists | Martin Gilens and Benjamin Paige [1] that shows Average | citizens have little impact on public policy. I have all | kinds of data, and clear examples in history to support | my position, I would be interested in seeing a counter | offer | | [1] https://pnhp.org/news/gilens-and-page-average- | citizens-have-... | Jolter wrote: | I guess there is a tacit assumption that you and the US | government have some shared goals, but that you share fewer | goals with ByteDance or the government of China. | | I guess most Americans aren't very scared of the feds | "because they have nothing to hide", which as we know is a | false sense of security in any surveillance state. But it | can still be true that you have /more/ to fear from the | government of China, given that they can have economic | impact on your life at a macro level. | phpisthebest wrote: | >>tacit assumption that you and the US government have | some shared goals | | My goal is to live my life free from abuse, coercion, and | infringement of my natural rights as a living human | | the governments goal (be it china or US) is power, and | control via the exclusive authority to initiate violence | on the people with in the sphere of influence | | I do not share any goals with government. | threeseed wrote: | In Australia, the Chinese government has been very | aggressive with our citizens. | | - Students have had family members back in China threatened | with imprisonment for merely attending protests. | | - Journalists have been kidnapped and are still missing. | | - Other individuals have been monitored by local embassy | staff. | | - Businesses have seen markets arbitrarily cut-off for any | form of criticism. | | Just because you have not been personally threatened | doesn't mean others haven't. | dragonwriter wrote: | This has also happened in the US. | cloverich wrote: | The FBI has the power to put you in a cage, and yet you are | not in a cage. China regularly puts its own citizens in a | cage or worse for offenses that are perfectly acceptable | here, such as criticizing our leadership. China is a large | and powerful country. China is an authoritarian state whose | leadership would unquestionably impose their will on us | could they. Recording data about us now to be used in 10, | 20, or 50 years in the same ways they are actively using it | agains their current citizens today doesn't seem far | fetched, however unlikely at this point in time. | causality0 wrote: | Would you be concerned if your childrens' school curriculum | had to get pre-approval from the Chinese government? That's | the quantity of exposure we already have. An entity | beholden to the CCP has an iron grip on the attention of | America's youth. | phpisthebest wrote: | I would not want my Children on TikTok if it was American | Owned. so the connection to China. | | TikTok is toxic trash for many reason well beyond its | connection to China | Bud wrote: | If they won't follow one set of laws, how will another set of | laws reliably solve the problem? They can just disobey those | laws, too. Anonymous login credentials can be de-anonymized in | all kinds of ways. | kube-system wrote: | That's often antithetical to the point of using social media. | The data that most people share on social media are either | inherently identifying, or easy to deanonymize. | ajsnigrutin wrote: | Telcos can still track their customers, and who knows which | three-letter agencies can get all that data. | | The only issue now is (it seems), that it's the chinese doing | it and not facebook/google or local telcos. | bigmattystyles wrote: | Were the journalists foolish enough to install the app (not | victim blaming but come on) or does the TikTok app scan for other | wifi signatures in the vicinity and that's how they correlated | the locations? | LarryMullins wrote: | > _Were the journalists foolish enough to install the app_ | | Foolish doesn't describe it, if they knew they were taking a | calculated risk. | | Suppose they knew there was a risk the app could be used to | track them, and maybe even a risk that tracking data could be | used to assassinate them. But if TikTok tracked them with the | app, that could also become part of their story against TikTok | and thus advance their journalistic career. Fortune favors the | bold. | jimbob45 wrote: | I was wondering this myself. Tiktok surely needs location data | permitted to track, no? I'm sure there are some heuristics it | can use, perhaps pinging servers or image matching pictures but | surely this could all be solved by putting TikTok in a | container with specifically limited permissions. | blessedwhiskers wrote: | Images probably have location data in the EXIF as well that | can be used for this. If notifications cause background data | fetch from their servers that could also probably leak IP | address. | joenathanone wrote: | There are multiple data points that can be used and/or | correlated to determine location, including IP address, if | permissions are enabled, nearby Bluetooth devices, nearby WiFi | MAC addresses, connected cell tower, and of course GPS. Also | they don't even need to be installed on the journalist's | device, but their child/spouse/coworker/close friends would | also do. | alphabetting wrote: | Tdlr: Tiktok's Chinese parent company used Tiktok user data to | track US journalists who uncovered they were accessing US user | data in China. | Patrol8394 wrote: | And yet people don't care and keep using it. It shows exactly why | you can't trust common sense and people to do the right thing. | rvz wrote: | Like I said before, TikTok must be fined in the billions for | abusing the privacy of its users. This is not the first time that | they have done this but now it is clear that they have admitted | this. | | They have been caught once [0] and have been caught again this | year [1] and lied about accessing the sensitive data of its own | users [2], [3], [4] and admitted it here. Clearly the fines in | [0] and [1] are extremely low and the fine must increase in the | billions since these are repeated privacy violations and haven't | learned anything from it. | | There is no excuse for billion dollar fines for TikTok. | | [0] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/14/technology/tiktok-kids- | pr... | | [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/26/technology/tiktok- | childre... | | [2] https://futurism.com/tiktok-spy-locations-specific-americans | | [3] | https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/emilybakerwhite/tiktok-... | | [4] https://techcrunch.com/2021/06/03/tiktok-just-gave-itself- | pe... | robswc wrote: | I truly wish Trump would have been able to actually ban TikTok | (or at least force a sale). | | The recent twitter files show that the bond between Government | and social media companies is a little too close... but it would | be foolish to suggest that the lesser of the two evils here is | China. | | It is actually insane that we let China do whatever they want | here while US companies are effectively prevented from gaining a | foothold in China. | nonethewiser wrote: | Yeah it was a shame this was blocked. | weezin wrote: | There are tons of valid criticism for the US intelligence | community, but when it isn't agenda driven they can be right | about a lot of things, for example knowing that Russia was | preparing to invade Ukraine. | sschueller wrote: | We need a law to generally make this illegal. Uber did the same | thing and Tesla hired PIs to do it. | lmm wrote: | Laws are meaningless without enforcement, and good luck getting | US law enforcement to enforce laws that they themselves are | breaking routinely. We need a whole culture shift in government | if we're going to have any hope of fixing this. | varenc wrote: | I generally agree, but that's no reason why we shouldn't push | for a law banning use of private data like this now. It seems | like a first step towards that culture shift we want. And | even if enforcement of this new law is lacking, I bet in the | TikTok situation the US gov we be happy to enforce it. | willio58 wrote: | 100% agree. We shouldn't just stop one company from doing this. | FormerBandmate wrote: | At the same time, TikTok is much more likely to follow the | laws of China than the US, while Facebook is the reverse. | China is an adversary of the US that does things like let | fentanyl flow unfettered here and withhold vital data on | Covid, if it were Spotify (based out of Sweden) it would be | very different | dang wrote: | Related: | | _ByteDance planned to use TikTok to surveil specific American | citizens_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33280176 - Oct | 2022 (208 comments) | | _Leaked Audio from TikTok Meetings - US User Data Repeatedly | Accessed from China_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31781146 - June 2022 (12 | comments) | sirsinsalot wrote: | No worse than what the US and UK (and other FVEY) have done for | years. Those in glass houses ... | notwokeno wrote: | Why are journalists running TikTok? | fn-mote wrote: | Guesses: | | 1. The same reason they're playing Clash Royale... down time, | filling the wait. Do you think they were on their employer- | provided phone? Do you think they even have an employer- | provided phone? | | 2. Maybe they also have a social media presence. That would be | a different issue, and actually easier to address by the | employer. | system2 wrote: | Ban this crap already. Save kids from this chinese nightmare. | Bud wrote: | Let's not fool ourselves. US companies have been doing the same | thing, and they will continue to. | system2 wrote: | At least we can punish American companies if they do | something shady. | MisterBastahrd wrote: | Sure, but since we explicitly won't, I feel that a lot of | this outrage is just BS. As a US citizen, I'm far more | concerned with the US government knowing where I am at all | times than China. We could pass a law that forbids the US | government to consume any personally identifiable data from | social media platforms without a warrant, but we won't. | ProAm wrote: | I think Ed Snowden proved to us this is not true. Room 614a | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A | LarryMullins wrote: | That was revealed several years before Snowden's | defection. | lmm wrote: | And yet nothing was done about it. | LarryMullins wrote: | Nor since. | | ProAm clarified that these were intended as two separate | examples, so fair enough. It just rubs me the wrong way | when people seem to give credit to Snowden for revealing | things which were already known. | ProAm wrote: | I meant that as two different things, both were largely | disregarded as punishable. | Bud wrote: | Can we? That seems to very much depend on who is in power | and who has benefitted from the shadiness in question. | ffssffss wrote: | Which US companies are tracking journalist locations for the | Chinese government? Tesla? | Bud wrote: | The claim wasn't that they did so for the Chinese | government. But Facebook, for example, did so, for its own | purposes. This is just as bad. We can't really have | journalism being threatened, regardless of whether it's | threatened by China, or supposedly-loyal US companies. | JumpCrisscross wrote: | > _Facebook, for example, did so, for its own purposes. | This is just as bad_ | | It's in a totally different league. Domestic corporation | spying for commercial purposes versus a militaristic | dictatorship with a track record of extrajudicial | harassment. | lmm wrote: | Large US corporations and their owners also have a track | record of extrajudicial harassment. | pksebben wrote: | Facebook perhaps, but it's hard to see the differences | between China and the US in terms of | spying/wiretapping/harassment. | | If we really wanted to avoid China spying on our | citizens, we'd implement broad and strong encryption | across our network - but we fight that (as a country) | because it would weaken our own surveillance. | | We could absolutely choose to deescalate in this field, | we just don't. | [deleted] | space_fountain wrote: | Also correct me if I'm wrong. The claim isn't that | ByteDance did it for the Chinese government, but that | they did it to try to find internal leakers | kranke155 wrote: | US has laws, independent courts and elections. | | You might want to debate it's level of efficiency and | fairness, but on the other side you have a dictatorship. | lmm wrote: | > US has laws, independent courts and elections. | | Most of which the NSA is exempted from. China has laws and | courts too. | [deleted] | biohacker85 wrote: | Is the threat of a foreign adversary spying on US citizens | the same as the US Government spying on its citizens? I'm in | the camp that a foreign adversary is a more dangerous | situation. | dang wrote: | You're welcome to make thoughtful comments on any side of the | issue, but please don't post unsubstantive comments and/or | flamebait. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it | is for. | | https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html | Alifatisk wrote: | Finally, this proved my paranoia to be true. | lloydatkinson wrote: | Where are the people now who were saying in previous threads | things like "tick tock is safe, there is no way they abuse their | users, invade privacy, or log devices on the users local wifi"? | crazygringo wrote: | Who was saying that? I feel like I've read a lot of HN threads | on TikTok, and don't feel like I've ever seen anyone here say | that, or no visible comments that weren't grayed out. | | People defending TikTok are generally questioning the risk of | this data being weaponized by the CCP and whether it's even | much of a weapon and whether that's worth it to ban them over. | Not over whether TikTok voluntarily follows some privacy | guidelines -- on that it's generally assumed they're either | already vacuuming up all they can, or could turn that on at any | time. | simmerup wrote: | They're busy shifting the goal posts | aaron695 wrote: | [dead] | jmyeet wrote: | Whatever complaints people have about how deep the tendrils of | the US government have infiltrated into US companies, there is at | least some separation and the rule of law. Yes, the government | can get warrants for pen registers, issue NSLs and the like but | there's still a process for that. | | This simply isn't true for the Chinese government and Chinese | companies. | | But the other issue, which is both more palatable and more | general, is one of reciprocity. China deliberately restricts | Western companies from their market. A key component of trade is | reciprocal market access. | lmm wrote: | > Yes, the government can get warrants for pen registers, issue | NSLs and the like but there's still a process for that. | | > This simply isn't true for the Chinese government and Chinese | companies. | | Huh? Do you think the Chinese intelligence services don't have | to go through processes and approvals before grabbing user | data? It's exactly the same thing - sure it's a secret court | that rubber-stamps every request put in front of it, but that's | no different from how NSLs work. | SoylentYellow wrote: | There is no requirement under the Chinese National | Intelligence Law for intelligence agencies to go through | courts for access. There is no due process for those | affected. That law also compels companies and citizens to | actively assist intelligence agencies. | dragonelite wrote: | Come on man don't be so naive. | ironyman wrote: | https://www.vox.com/recode/23453786/tiktok-bytedance-cfius-d... | | Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner argues that | even if there is nothing wrong with Tiktok it ought to be banned | because it gives China a crucial edge in the development of AI | tools that American companies don't have. China is able to freely | access Western markets but not the other way around. | | > Finally, there's the fear that China will be able to use | TikTok's data to power its AI innovations. That's an advantage | the US won't have because its social media apps are banned in | China and because there aren't laws that would compel social | media companies to hand over data just because the government | wants it. | | > "They are aggregating literally billions and billions of images | of not just Americans but people from around the world who are | using TikTok," Warner said. "That gives them so much more data to | help them create tools that can be utilized in the AI world." | thomasahle wrote: | > That's an advantage the US won't have because [its social | media apps are banned in China and] because there aren't laws | that would compel social media companies to hand over data just | because the government wants it. | | Wait, why would it be an advantage for creation of AI in the US | if social media companies (or company) could be more easily | compelled to give our data to the government? Given that it's | the social media company we are expecting to produce the AI | anyway. | wyldberry wrote: | Because Bytedance and similar orgs are merged with the CCP. | So they pass data up the chain, and the CCP can make new | rules, investments, and directives with it. This allows the | CCP to accelerate with this data in ways that the US cannot. | | So CCP gets full access to American residents, without | reciprocating US social media actions within it, and then | compels Bytedance to give it access. | guhidalg wrote: | Can you give me a real example of this data? I don't doubt | it happens, I just want an example to cite. | nonrandomstring wrote: | > "the misconduct of a few individuals" | | Always is. Bad apples. Rogue actors. Acting alone. Examples made. | Lessons learned. Public assured. Throw the low rank scapegoats | under a bus. And keep praying we're as stupid as you make | yourself look. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-12-22 23:00 UTC)