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UT-Austin blocks access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi networks

texastribune.org

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Re: UT-Austin blocks access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi networks

#81

Post by rchaud »

purpleblue wrote: post #31

Does China allow Instagram and Facebook in the country?

No, but it has allowed $9bn in Texas pension fund dollars to flow into Tencent and Alibaba, companies heavily involved in churning through all that sweet, sweet US user data.

Follow the money. This is political point scoring at its most brazen.

> Yet through Texas’ seven public pension funds, which are fueled primarily by contributions from members but are guaranteed and backed by state taxpayer dollars, $9.12 billion is invested in companies in China, based on a Hearst Newspapers analysis of figures provided by the seven funds — representing a multi-billion dollar bet in the success of the Communist country’s economy.

https://www.expressnews.com/news/legislature/article/Texas-i...

Re: UT-Austin blocks access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi networks

#82

Post by idiotsecant »

AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #44
guessbest wrote: post #15

> In a statement, a representative from TikTok said they are disappointed by the news. > "We're disappointed that so many states are jumping on the political bandwagon to enact policies that will do nothing to advance cybersecurity in their states and are based on unfounded falsehoods about TikTok," spokesperson Jamal Brown wrote. Regardless of you stance on Texas and Texans and politics, the above is a pretty funny…

Obviously someone should've just hosted right-wing talking heads on TikTok so that UT-Austin could be sued under Texas' own anti-censorship law: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/09/texas-bans-onlin...

Somewhere a TikTok lawyer is writing a frantic email.

Re: UT-Austin blocks access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi networks

#83

Post by Nextgrid »

rchaud wrote: post #63
Nextgrid wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read-only access can still be allowed. I suspect the "violation of ToS" is simply privacy - they don't want to serve traffic to someone they can't stalk.

Read-only access would still be enough to launch DDOS attacks. I've never heard of any social media service offering read-only access to logged in users.

> I've never heard of any social media service offering read-only access to logged in users.

Twitter allows read-only access even to suspended accounts as well as when you go over certain rate-limits (I believe there was a daily tweet limit at one point, not sure if still there).

Re: UT-Austin blocks access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi networks

#85

Post by TurkishPoptart »

1MachineElf wrote: post #66
maerF0x0 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

tell him what?

If I had to guess, it would probably be some revelation about Bill Gates being the biggest private owner of farmland in the US: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/apr/05/bill-g...

I wish he would just grow trees on those properties. For all we know all that land will be used to deploy soylent/fake meat alternative/cricket meat a la "eat the bugs".

Re: UT-Austin blocks access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi networks

#88

Post by rchaud »

droopyEyelids wrote: post #4

Does anyone know how to check Gov. Greg Abbott for donations from Facebook/Facebook controlled PACs?

I don't think Facebook cares about picking up some market share from the handful of users of TX state-funded Internet.

This is just a token move to make it look like Abbott is 'tough on China'. I see a presidential run in his future.

Re: UT-Austin blocks access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi networks

#89

Post by wombat_trouble »

Quillbert182 wrote: post #69
rchaud wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A proposal to stop the purchase of property by nameless numbered entities ("123 LLC") would have my full support. It's not like foreign buyers put down "China Inc" on the purchase forms.

It seems to me like it might be a good idea to require citizenship to create an LLC.

What would that accomplish? Most LLCs are created (incorporated) by a lawyer who then cedes control to the intended owners. Even if you had a requirement for a US person, you'd just have figureheads collecting some nominal salary. Plenty of low-income folks would be eager to get an extra $500 a month for doing nothing.

For what it's worth, the formation of an LLC is a state affair, and every state has its own rules around requirements, reporting, transparency, etc. Most states keep the paperwork public; some states don't, but these are not the states where housing shortages are all that profound.

Re: UT-Austin blocks access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi networks

#90

Post by tsimionescu »

bena wrote: post #70
CamperBob2 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why shouldn't it be up to the user? Who asked the government? This is not how the Internet was supposed to work.

Would you rather know if it was up to the government or not know? Because the case with TikTok is that we do not know what the Chinese government is going to do with whatever it collects from the app. Or even if they do. Or anything really. Now, while I think banning TikTok's traffic on the campus network is more of a stunt than anything worthwhile. I do see the argument from banning TikTok and just about any other n…

This is about banning access to TikTok for client devices of a campus network. It has nothing to do with banning the TikTok app on government-issued phones.
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