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

Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

wsj.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 118 posts

Re: Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

#61

Post by bilbo0s »

scarface74 wrote: post #40
bilbo0s wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand your question, but I'm sorry, that just sounds bush league to me. So you have to change your business to suit every political party that comes to power? That's a lot of unpredictability. How can you run a business like that? Plus, what if elections are "postponed until a more appropriate time"? I mean, the environment would just be riddled with so much uncertainty that I'm not sure how an honest business…

I’m so confused. Didn’t I just read several submissions where almost every person was cheering the government threatening to become involved in Big Tech?

You may have, but not from me.

I've never been big on the government getting involved. In my view, big tech has no problem that the market won't work out.

The privacy problem, (well, I consider it a problem, others may not), happens when big government gets involved with big tech. We actually need less of that, not more.

Re: Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

#62

Post by bezmenov »

alfiedotwtf wrote: post #56
threeseed wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's be clear apps like TikTok are a threat to national security. Widely deployed apps that capture location data can and have been used to determine the location of military bases and assets.

If an app is a national security threat, maybe people shouldn’t be carrying them around military bases :shrug:

TikTok has been banned by the military since last year.

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2019/12/30/army-follows-...

Re: Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

#63

Post by searchableguy »

scarface74 wrote: post #40
bilbo0s wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand your question, but I'm sorry, that just sounds bush league to me. So you have to change your business to suit every political party that comes to power? That's a lot of unpredictability. How can you run a business like that? Plus, what if elections are "postponed until a more appropriate time"? I mean, the environment would just be riddled with so much uncertainty that I'm not sure how an honest business…

I’m so confused. Didn’t I just read several submissions where almost every person was cheering the government threatening to become involved in Big Tech?

Have you compared the users on those submissions? They might be completely different.

Re: Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

#64

Post by searchableguy »

bilbo0s wrote: post #61
scarface74 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m so confused. Didn’t I just read several submissions where almost every person was cheering the government threatening to become involved in Big Tech?

You may have, but not from me. I've never been big on the government getting involved. In my view, big tech has no problem that the market won't work out. The privacy problem, (well, I consider it a problem, others may not), happens when big government gets involved with big tech. We actually need less of that, not more.

HN is an international site and has quite diverse population from what I have seen. Some Indian threads are pro government while others are completely anti-government. There are so many variables for this - one could be timezone and day of the week. I have a list of usernames for people who participate on those threads so I know it's different every time.

Re: Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

#65

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

alfiedotwtf wrote: post #56
threeseed wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's be clear apps like TikTok are a threat to national security. Widely deployed apps that capture location data can and have been used to determine the location of military bases and assets.

If an app is a national security threat, maybe people shouldn’t be carrying them around military bases :shrug:

Many of those bases will have baby + home security cameras which are far more obviously a security risk, because they (potentially) send WiFi passwords home.

Trump's move is pure theatre. He has no clue about real security and he's throwing his weight around like an attention-seeking child, because that's what he does.

This is an entirely orthogonal issue to something that's been missing in the West for decades - a coherent program of IT security and IoT and app standards which define exactly what products and apps can and can't do, and which enforces a testing and certification process to make sure products and services stay within the lines.

And also... mandated protections for user data - something the EU is moving towards, but which the US still seems to be having issues with.

Between IoT, IT infrastructure, poor corporate security, and unregulated data capture, there are much more serious security threats than the TikTok app.

Re: Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

#66

Post by MarkMarine »

threeseed wrote: post #53
Slartie wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except for there being this joker called "national security" which magically allows practically anything to be ordered by the executive, because you can obviously reframe anything into a matter of national security, even short video clips of dancing teenagers.

Let's be clear apps like TikTok are a threat to national security. Widely deployed apps that capture location data can and have been used to determine the location of military bases and assets.

This is a parity of a NatSec threat. Any base that is legitimately secret would disallow it’s personal from using apps like this. And that data is trivially replaced by satellite photography. Non secret bases are supported by hundreds of “Third Country Nationals” that do everything from trash collection to serving food in the chow hall. TikTok is not a natsec threat unless our military personnel are posting natsec information to it. Pretty easy to solve that problem and not ban it for everyone.

Re: Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

#67

Post by bigpumpkin »

dvt wrote: post #60
kanox wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Treating foreign media as a "national security issue" is extremely scary. This is not something that free societies do.

> Treating foreign media as a "national security issue" is extremely scary. Not really. RT and Al Jazeera has (rightfully) suffered much of the same scrutiny. There's a fundamental difference between something extremely partisan (think Breitbart or HuffPo) and something state-sponsored . Let's not bury our heads in the sand here.

RT and Al Jazeera may suffer scrutiny, but the US government cannot ban Americans from reading them.

Re: Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

#68

Post by tzs »

ardit33 wrote: post #20

If Tiktok was European/Japanese/Korean/Canadian this would not happen, as those countries are free democracies and work with a similar/common rule of law 1. China doesn’t play with the same rules, and it has been proven to be a malicious player 2. They don’t allow western companies to operate freely in their country, why should we let them to? 3. The US and to a lesser degree Europe, are in a de-facto new Cold War, a…

If it is sold to Microsoft, is any of that still applicable?

Re: Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

#69

Post by throwaway5752 »

ardit33 wrote: post #20

If Tiktok was European/Japanese/Korean/Canadian this would not happen, as those countries are free democracies and work with a similar/common rule of law 1. China doesn’t play with the same rules, and it has been proven to be a malicious player 2. They don’t allow western companies to operate freely in their country, why should we let them to? 3. The US and to a lesser degree Europe, are in a de-facto new Cold War, a…

Whatever is wrong with China, and there is plenty, the US and particularly the president's behavior is dictatorial here.

Perhaps the administration could outline the new intel that has come to light in the last month that has made this such an urgent issue right now, as opposed to any other time in the past year.

Otherwise, as a layman, I might think that the humiliating "million ticket reservation" prank of the president's Tulsa, OK rally that adolescents orchestrated on TikTok is what triggered it.

Re: Microsoft and Bytedance Put TikTok Talks on Hold After Trump Signals Opposition

#70

Post by cmiles74 »

marcinzm wrote: post #28
jackson1442 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the government wants to restrict the ability of Chinese business to grow in the US, that's fine, but it should be under the existing framework of law that we follow. This should be passed through Congress and the SC as a law , not an executive order. We have Checks & Balances for a reason.

Executive orders aren't magic, there's some law they will reference as giving the president the power to issue such an order.

I don't see any reason to think this will be the case. The White House issued an executive order meant to intimidate Twitter after they labeled some of his tweets. That order did not cite any relevant body of law.
Post reply on HN