{"id":9494,"date":"2022-12-09T13:45:47","date_gmt":"2022-12-09T13:45:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=9494"},"modified":"2022-12-09T13:45:47","modified_gmt":"2022-12-09T13:45:47","slug":"maybe-trump-was-right-about-tiktok","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=9494","title":{"rendered":"Maybe Trump was right about TikTok"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\n“TikTok is owned by ByteDance, which is based in China. It isn\u2019t an arm of the Chinese Communist Party, but Chinese laws say it can be forced to assist the Chinese government. That could mean handing all the data its app has collected about American citizens to China. And TikTok collects a lot of data<\/a> about its users.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Chinese government has established clear pathways to empower itself to surveil individuals, to gather data from corporations, and through the 2017 [National Intelligence] law<\/a>, to aggregate that data on government servers,\u201d said Aynne Kokas, director of the University of Virginia\u2019s East Asia Center and author of the recently released book Trafficking Data: How China Is Winning the Battle for Digital Sovereignty<\/em>. \u201cTo the degree to which any of this is happening is difficult to know.\u201dTikTok has repeatedly said it isn\u2019t happening and that it never will. It\u2019s also tried to distance itself from its Chinese parent company. But those claims have been undermined by recent reports that say ByteDance has a great deal<\/a> of control over TikTok and its direction, that China does have access to US data<\/a>, and that ByteDance has tried to get location data<\/a> from a few Americans through their TikTok accounts. (To these reports, TikTok has said that the app doesn\u2019t collect precise location data and therefore couldn\u2019t surveil US users this way, and that leaked conversations about Chinese employees having access to US data were in regards to figuring out to turn that access off.)”
…
” They also fear that TikTok, directed by the Chinese government, will push propaganda or disinformation, which wouldn\u2019t be hard to do considering how TikTok feeds its users so much content with its \u201cFor You\u201d algorithm<\/a>. It\u2019s also not out of the realm of possibility that it would do this. A 2019 report<\/a> showed that ByteDance had a list of banned content on TikTok, which included Tiananmen Square, Tibet, and Taiwan. And China has been caught using social media to spread disinformation or propaganda before (as have many other countries, including the United States<\/a>). But that was through someone else\u2019s platform. With TikTok, China could directly control what\u2019s on the platform and how it\u2019s distributed. It can\u2019t do that with Facebook or Instagram.”  
…
“there\u2019s the fear that China will be able to use TikTok\u2019s data to power its AI innovations. That\u2019s an advantage the US won\u2019t have because its social media apps are banned in China and because there aren\u2019t laws that would compel social media companies to hand over data just because the government wants it.”
…
“While some have come around to thinking Trump was right to want to ban TikTok, they don\u2019t necessarily agree with how he tried to do it. Courts didn\u2019t agree either, and blocked his August 2020 executive order<\/a> that would have forced ByteDance to sell TikTok or be banned. But it never made it to an actual trial, as Biden took office and revoked the executive order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Republican leaders have criticized President Biden for not being as tough as Trump on TikTok and appearing to support the platform by reaching out<\/a> to some of its biggest influencers. But the Biden administration isn\u2019t going easy on TikTok, either. Biden recently issued<\/a> an executive order expanding the definition of national security for the purposes of CFIUS reviews to include data and technologies necessary to \u201cprotect United States technical leadership.\u201d It doesn\u2019t directly address TikTok, but it certainly includes it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

CFIUS, by the way, has been reviewing<\/a> ByteDance\u2019s acquisition of Musical.ly for several years now. CFIUS doesn\u2019t comment on ongoing investigations, but TikTok said in a statement to Recode that \u201cwe will not comment on the specifics of confidential discussions with the US government, but we are confident that we are on a path to fully satisfy all reasonable US national security concerns.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To that end, TikTok is currently trying<\/a> to wall US data off from China to satisfy CFIUS\u2019s concerns in an effort it\u2019s dubbed \u201cProject Texas<\/a>.\u201d That would keep what\u2019s considered \u201cprotected\u201d data on US users on US-based servers run by Oracle, with controls over who has access to it.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“A deal between CFIUS and TikTok has reportedly<\/a> been imminent for weeks now, but it hasn\u2019t happened yet. There are doubts that anything short of forcing ByteDance to sell off TikTok would guarantee that China can\u2019t access user data or do anything about concerns over pushing propaganda and disinformation.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“These problems could be solved very quickly if ByteDance were to sell off TikTok, but that doesn\u2019t seem to be an option. The Chinese government would have<\/a> to approve such a move, and experts say that\u2019s very unlikely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Chinese government loves TikTok,\u201d Lewis said, pointing out that it\u2019s the only social media app from China that\u2019s been successful outside of the country. \u201cThe Chinese government will protect it.\u201d”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.vox.com\/recode\/23453786\/tiktok-bytedance-cfius-data-trump-ban<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“TikTok is owned by ByteDance, which is based in China. It isn\u2019t an arm of the Chinese Communist Party, but Chinese laws say it can be forced to assist the Chinese government. That could mean handing all the data its app has collected about American citizens to China. And TikTok collects a lot of data about its users.
\n\u201cThe Chinese government has established clear pathways to empower itself to surveil individuals, to gather data from corporations, and through the 2017 [National Intelligence] law, to aggregate that data on government servers,\u201d said Aynne Kokas, director of the University of Virginia\u2019s East Asia Center and author of the recently released book Trafficking Data: How China Is Winning the Battle for Digital Sovereignty. \u201cTo the degree to which any of this is happening is difficult to know.\u201d<\/p>\n

TikTok has repeatedly said it isn\u2019t happening and that it never will. It\u2019s also tried to distance itself from its Chinese parent company. But those claims have been undermined by recent reports that say ByteDance has a great deal of control over TikTok and its direction, that China does have access to US data, and that ByteDance has tried to get location data from a few Americans through their TikTok accounts. (To these reports, TikTok has said that the app doesn\u2019t collect precise location data and therefore couldn\u2019t surveil US users this way, and that leaked conversations about Chinese employees having access to US data were in regards to figuring out to turn that access off.)”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

” They also fear that TikTok, directed by the Chinese government, will push propaganda or disinformation, which wouldn\u2019t be hard to do considering how TikTok feeds its users so much content with its \u201cFor You\u201d algorithm. It\u2019s also not out of the realm of possibility that it would do this. A 2019 report showed that ByteDance had a list of banned content on TikTok, which included Tiananmen Square, Tibet, and Taiwan. And China has been caught using social media to spread disinformation or propaganda before (as have many other countries, including the United States). But that was through someone else\u2019s platform. With TikTok, China could directly control what\u2019s on the platform and how it\u2019s distributed. It can\u2019t do that with Facebook or Instagram.” <\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“there\u2019s the fear that China will be able to use TikTok\u2019s data to power its AI innovations. That\u2019s an advantage the US won\u2019t have because its social media apps are banned in China and because there aren\u2019t laws that would compel social media companies to hand over data just because the government wants it.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“While some have come around to thinking Trump was right to want to ban TikTok, they don\u2019t necessarily agree with how he tried to do it. Courts didn\u2019t agree either, and blocked his August 2020 executive order that would have forced ByteDance to sell TikTok or be banned. But it never made it to an actual trial, as Biden took office and revoked the executive order.
\nRepublican leaders have criticized President Biden for not being as tough as Trump on TikTok and appearing to support the platform by reaching out to some of its biggest influencers. But the Biden administration isn\u2019t going easy on TikTok, either. Biden recently issued an executive order expanding the definition of national security for the purposes of CFIUS reviews to include data and technologies necessary to \u201cprotect United States technical leadership.\u201d It doesn\u2019t directly address TikTok, but it certainly includes it.<\/p>\n

CFIUS, by the way, has been reviewing ByteDance\u2019s acquisition of Musical.ly for several years now. CFIUS doesn\u2019t comment on ongoing investigations, but TikTok said in a statement to Recode that \u201cwe will not comment on the specifics of confidential discussions with the US government, but we are confident that we are on a path to fully satisfy all reasonable US national security concerns.\u201d<\/p>\n

To that end, TikTok is currently trying to wall US data off from China to satisfy CFIUS\u2019s concerns in an effort it\u2019s dubbed \u201cProject Texas.\u201d That would keep what\u2019s considered \u201cprotected\u201d data on US users on US-based servers run by Oracle, with controls over who has access to it.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“A deal between CFIUS and TikTok has reportedly been imminent for weeks now, but it hasn\u2019t happened yet. There are doubts that anything short of forcing ByteDance to sell off TikTok would guarantee that China can\u2019t access user data or do anything about concerns over pushing propaganda and disinformation.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“These problems could be solved very quickly if ByteDance were to sell off TikTok, but that doesn\u2019t seem to be an option. The Chinese government would have to approve such a move, and experts say that\u2019s very unlikely.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Chinese government loves TikTok,\u201d Lewis said, pointing out that it\u2019s the only social media app from China that\u2019s been successful outside of the country. \u201cThe Chinese government will protect it.\u201d”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[89,328,88],"class_list":["post-9494","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article-share","tag-china","tag-social-media","tag-tiktok"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9494","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9494"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9494\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9495,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9494\/revisions\/9495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}