Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

India bans TikTok, WeChat, and dozens of other Chinese apps

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

471–480 of 847 posts

Re: India bans TikTok, WeChat, and dozens of other Chinese apps

#471

Post by krn »

OGWhales wrote: post #452
moreorless wrote: post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that his computer conveniently crashed and cannot backup his claims is pretty convincing?

Well since that edit of his was from 1 day ago, hopefully he does show the little proof he has remaining soon. I am wary of his claims too.

Yes, that part about not being able to back up his claims wasn't there, when I first read that comment yesterday. And I also don't like that he mixes the technical critique with the moral critique of TikTok, which makes him look biased.

Still, it's a well known fact that authoritarian regimes tend to use all the tools available to them for spying in foreign countries. That's why Russia's Yandex, VKontakte, and Mail.ru are banned in Ukraine since 2017.

Re: India bans TikTok, WeChat, and dozens of other Chinese apps

#472

Post by product50 »

bad_user wrote: post #401
product50 wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And why should we believe you vs. Plato?

You shouldn't believe me or Plato, unless you like religion. You should believe in empirical evidence. Is it based on empirical evidence? Is it based for example on longitudinal social studies? The answer is no. And certainly absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence but it's baffling to me how people can cite this as fact, even if it might as well be bullshit.

I hope you realize that for the uninformed, like me, your response is as dubious as OPs. All you are saying that this is false and it has been proven by empirical evidence - trust me.

Re: India bans TikTok, WeChat, and dozens of other Chinese apps

#473

Post by SuoDuanDao »

ianleeclark wrote: post #57
saltedonion wrote: post #42

India is absolutely right in banning TikTok as it is a significant national securities threat. As long as the platforms recommendation and ranking algos are a black box, there is no guarantee that China isn’t conducting misinformation campaigns via the platform. At the very least, the government should audit the algos and make sure China can’t arbitrarily alter ranking results.

Are YouTube algorithms open? I don't really see a difference here. Nation state vs. private corporation is different on paper, but I don't see why. They're both going to react to material stimuli to increase their standings.

Let's be honest here; if India's relations with USA had soured to the same degree as with PRC, Youtube would be the one getting banned.

Re: India bans TikTok, WeChat, and dozens of other Chinese apps

#474

Post by dumb1224 »

foepys wrote: post #169
chrischen wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The China censors things so we should too stance just seems to strengthen their position of censorship...

Quite the opposite. China (the country, not China the economy) is investing billions into developing tech companies to surveil their citizens. Those apps are all centrally controlled by the Chinese government. They can freely suppress discussions without you ever knowing. Hell, they don't even need to censor it but only need to make it less discoverable. As soon as those apps reach the western hemisphere (or just any…

I think quite the contrary, China has very limited interest in using propaganda to influence the western-sphere. I used to be very inline with these news but as my old friends from youth progress in their careers in China (many in those 'state based' sectors), I grow increasingly skeptical as I know more about their mundane jobs. Yes a lot of policies seem to be from a backward society, but actually a lot are benign and these perceived 'agenda' don't really exist in real life. To be quite frank technology-wise China is still vastly behind world's frontier.

Re: India bans TikTok, WeChat, and dozens of other Chinese apps

#475

Post by colordrops »

banachtarski wrote: post #458
colordrops wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ignorance of US history of endless human rights abuses (including torture) both domestic and foreign by the US is not an excuse for being condescending and overly confident on an internet forum.

Let's talk about modern day since that's the topic at hand. Who was the last US citizen you know of to be arrested, detained, and killed for voicing opposition to the way the government is run. I'm not saying the US government is perfect (especially in this time, far from it), I'm just saying the comparison isn't remotely apropos. I would say I have the "correct" level of confidence in this regard.

I am talking about the modern day. Why the qualification "US citizen"? Are murders outside the border less of a crime? Are human lives outside the border less valuable? Also, is murder for using speech a much greater crime than murder for other reasons? There are very recent examples of unjust murder of US citizens by the government.

Re: India bans TikTok, WeChat, and dozens of other Chinese apps

#477

Post by microcolonel »

pvelagal wrote: post #387
learnstats2 wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should India ban a Chinese social media company and not an US social media company, it's a matter of national security? This claim is just xenophobic nonsense.

China bans every app ? Xenophobic nonsense ? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_websites_blocked_in_ma...

Wikipedia notes: This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it

There's nothing xenophobic about the claim that PRC blocks a huge portion of the internet. I operate several websites that are blocked by CCP in PRC, despite having no relation to any policy priority of the CCP or law/edict in PRC.

Re: India bans TikTok, WeChat, and dozens of other Chinese apps

#478

Post by pmontra »

pphysch wrote: post #414
secabeen wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The only two political parties in the US, for instance, differ remarkably little in terms of foreign policy and labor rights. Before Trump, I would probably have agreed with you, but these days, I don't know how you can say that. Trump has made major breaks with the foreign policy establishment over the past 3 years, and continues to do so (pulling half of our troops out of Germany is a good example of this). On la…

Both parties broadly promote global US military and economic supremacy (unipolarity), draconic IP laws, corporate tax benefits, social division on immutable identity issues, anticommunism, etc. There is wiggle room (i.e. Overton window), as you point out, but the main thrust is clear and opposition is not tolerated in an institutional sense. At best, the establishment Dems have been passive observers to the catastrop…

> Both parties broadly promote global US military and economic supremacy (unipolarity),

Maybe that's the goal but the execution is lacking. Seen from outside the USA it seems that the influence and the prestige of the United States are lower now than at any time in my life. The apex was any year in the 90s.

Obama started the trend. Trump accelerated it. Dealing with allies as if they were enemies doesn't help to keep a supremacy. Everybody needs friends, even big countries.

Re: India bans TikTok, WeChat, and dozens of other Chinese apps

#479

Post by puranjay »

jryle70 wrote: post #462
puranjay wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remind me when they drop bombs on an African country's capital and hang its leader, all on a false charge of possessing WMDs. I see absolutely no way that any American can ethically justify the invasion of Iraq.

> Remind me when they drop bombs on an African country's capital and hang its leader, all on a false charge of possessing WMDs. They didn't. On the other hand they were the master of Khmer Rouge, who carried out a genocide killing millions of Cambodians in 1970s - [0] > In April 1975, Khmer Rouge seized power in Cambodia, and in January, 1976, Democratic Kampuchea was established. During the Cambodian genocide, the C…

If we're going to talk about countries using their proxies to control and suppress native populations, then we can have an entire discussion about America's role in South America.

I'm not condoning China's past at all - I condemn what they did, and what they are doing right now. But any criticism of China can't come from a position of moral superiority, as it often does from western critics.

Re: India bans TikTok, WeChat, and dozens of other Chinese apps

#480

Post by lioeters »

riverlong wrote: post #356

I'm seeing lots of comments about national security-style concerns, and framing this in terms of the recent India-China skirmishes. That all makes sense. Where I think a lot of folks are missing the point is that this is also a tremendous boost to local Indian entrepreneurship. One of the really clever aspects of China's Great Firewall is that it keeps out international competition, which would crush local startups.…

This is a good point, for me the most intriguing aspect of this ban.

Not only is it a good idea from security perspective - as well as privacy as a selling point - by forbidding specific, popular foreign services, it opens up the market for domestic players to grow. This is what China has done, and now India is doing the same to them.

Overall, this seems like a win for the people in India.

Post reply on HN