Great news. The fact that a company from the unfriendly country collects biometrical data may finally provoke enough outrage that such data collection gets forbidden for everyone .
Not really. Tiktok is bad because all of the sudden China became bad. It wasn't bad few years ago; some western countries such the UK loved to say how good China is. The U.S apps are "good" because they are PRISM-enabled and your have nothing to hide from the U.S gov, right?
> It wasn't bad few years ago; some western countries such the UK loved to say how good China is.
Is this collection different from, say, Meta? I believe they collect all the same information via Instagram. And before someone says Meta is an American company, not controlled by an adversary, let me recall that it’s controlled by Zuckerberg who spent $419 million to influence US election administration in a seemingly partisan way (“democracy hacking” as another commenter said). Meta may not be YOUR adversary, but t…
> Is this collection different from, say, Meta? I believe they collect all the same information via Instagram. Who's doing the collecting often matters much more than what is actually collected. The important context here is we seem to be transitioning away from the era of kumbaya free market globalism into an era of tenser geopolitical rivalries and more conflict.
> Who's doing the collecting often matters much more than what is actually collected Correct, therefore far more attention ought be put to domestic corporate and government spying on the public because they have got a far stronger leverage over the public's mind than foreign companies whom do not Also, wouldn't it just be funny if Meta had some internal deals to acquire Tiktoks data? Lastly, if memory serves Tiktok m…
It should be unacceptable regardless of country of origin.
I agree. But until then, what do you think the people should do?
Or rather, which system is more actionable for the local public, the answer to that is ofc the US, if you can't even get your own country to not spy on its citizens either through corporate espionage or through direct gov espionage, what hope do you hold of tangling with foreign countries to coerce them to also not spy? If anything it seems hypocrite to do that!
Great news. The fact that a company from the unfriendly country collects biometrical data may finally provoke enough outrage that such data collection gets forbidden for everyone .
Not really. Tiktok is bad because all of the sudden China became bad. It wasn't bad few years ago; some western countries such the UK loved to say how good China is. The U.S apps are "good" because they are PRISM-enabled and your have nothing to hide from the U.S gov, right?
It all started to go downhil when Xi decided he wanted to become the Chinese Kaiser.
It’s incredible that the US allowed TikTok (which is by all measures a chinese spy tool) to become such a dominant social network. India got it right from the beggining by banning TikTok. They saw the immense threat and didn’t hesitate. China, by principle, has always banned all foreign information technology companies. What seemed hostile for us, it’s a reasonable play if you understand the unmeasurable power of mas…
The fact that India would consider TikTok a threat but not Meta leads me to believe that it wasn't done on a purely espionage basis. The threat of TikTok, today, it still theoretical, while Facebook has done measurable harm to India's neighbors.
A security researcher wrote an article while back and it was shocking to see how much data TikTok was collecting: - biometrics - what words are mentioned in the video, popularity - surrounding wifi, location data - your contacts (presumably to cross link to social media platforms) I just can't believe that a powerful country like America is letting a not-so-friendly military/civilian complex infiltrate it for somewha…
Is this collection different from, say, Meta? I believe they collect all the same information via Instagram. And before someone says Meta is an American company, not controlled by an adversary, let me recall that it’s controlled by Zuckerberg who spent $419 million to influence US election administration in a seemingly partisan way (“democracy hacking” as another commenter said). Meta may not be YOUR adversary, but t…
Meta is different because of the US fails as a state, they lose. China doesn't.
Meta might still be a shitty company, but their incentives are not to gather intelligence against US citizens that could be used to conduct cyber attacks or plan for military operations.
A security researcher wrote an article while back and it was shocking to see how much data TikTok was collecting: - biometrics - what words are mentioned in the video, popularity - surrounding wifi, location data - your contacts (presumably to cross link to social media platforms) I just can't believe that a powerful country like America is letting a not-so-friendly military/civilian complex infiltrate it for somewha…
Meanwhile last time I brought this up typical HN contrarians denied it!
A security researcher wrote an article while back and it was shocking to see how much data TikTok was collecting: - biometrics - what words are mentioned in the video, popularity - surrounding wifi, location data - your contacts (presumably to cross link to social media platforms) I just can't believe that a powerful country like America is letting a not-so-friendly military/civilian complex infiltrate it for somewha…
Is this collection different from, say, Meta? I believe they collect all the same information via Instagram. And before someone says Meta is an American company, not controlled by an adversary, let me recall that it’s controlled by Zuckerberg who spent $419 million to influence US election administration in a seemingly partisan way (“democracy hacking” as another commenter said). Meta may not be YOUR adversary, but t…
For the biometrics part, yes: Instagram never used biometrics, or at least they didn’t until this week when they started using it for an age verification process, but even then there’s no collection of biometrics in regular usage. Facebook used faceprints until 2021, when they shut down those features under regulatory pressure, but even while the feature was active it was off by default rather than a condition of using the service.
And today we hear: FCC Commissioner Calls for Apple and Google to Ban TikTok Over 'Surreptitious' Data Practices https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31921200
Unfortunately regulating tech companies is politically untenable since he was nominated by the previous administration. They will replace him with someone who will toe the line. > Commissioner Carr was nominated to the FCC by President Trump and confirmed unanimously by the United States Senate. https://www.fcc.gov/about/leadership/brendan-carr > His term runs from July 1, 2018 to June 30, 2023. https://en.wikipedia.…