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Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

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Re: Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

#881

Post by pineaux »

throwaway4good wrote: post #866
noobermin wrote: post #842

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest, the use of the word "enemy" is far too strong, it sounds like we are at war with them while they somehow supply half of our goods at prices we've grown accustomed to. "Adversary" is a weaker word that is more apt (which you use later), where the US is not on the friendliest terms with China but isn't in an outright war with them. Words matter, at the very least to avoid starting nationalistic flamewars…

The US has an official list of enemies and that includes China. I believe the list was introduced under Trump and is determined by the sitting president: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-15/subtitle-A/part-7/subp...

Your link names them "adversaries". Its an official list of adversaries.

Re: Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

#882

Post by bjourne »

inkyoto wrote: post #857
aprilthird2021 wrote: post #835

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can someone please explain to me what the security threat is? I still haven't understood it. If it's that China will know more about Americans through data ingestion, they can already do that. Americans willingly upload every little bit of their lives to YouTube, Twitch, and tons of other platforms. Not to mention that Temu is the most downloaded shopping app in the US. And what kind of attack can TikTok information…

> Can someone please explain to me what the security threat is? I still haven't understood it. Facial recognition database and tracking people at a global scale. With advances in computing power and unsupervised machine learning, correlating a person with the person's surroundings is now largely or fully automated – what used to take forensic experts weeks, months or years to hunt down a person by poring over indirec…

> With advances in computing power and unsupervised machine learning, correlating a person with the person's surroundings is now largely or fully automated – what used to take forensic experts weeks, months or years to hunt down a person by poring over indirect clues in photographs or CCTV camera footage, is now almost instantenous.

I don't know of any system capable of doing what you describe. But if such a system existed it could just use publicly available videos from Facebook and Instagram. It wouldn't need its own social media platform to feed it data.

Re: Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

#883

Post by pineaux »

derelicta wrote: post #877
gigatexal wrote: post #809

I see this as a national security threat that it is. The potential for abuse from the CCP on the minds of US users exists as does the tracking the app could do and every data point that is generated is stored and potentially useful for blackmail or otherwise on members of Congress or others. The US and its allies got rid of Chinese telecom hardware from their networks for the very same reasons now it’s time to do the…

CIA and FBI propaganda campaigns on US and Europe's population are however acceptable somehow.

QAnon is not really accepted.

Re: Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

#884

Post by ChrisRR »

throwaway4good wrote: post #866
noobermin wrote: post #842

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest, the use of the word "enemy" is far too strong, it sounds like we are at war with them while they somehow supply half of our goods at prices we've grown accustomed to. "Adversary" is a weaker word that is more apt (which you use later), where the US is not on the friendliest terms with China but isn't in an outright war with them. Words matter, at the very least to avoid starting nationalistic flamewars…

The US has an official list of enemies and that includes China. I believe the list was introduced under Trump and is determined by the sitting president: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-15/subtitle-A/part-7/subp...

The word enemy is not used on that page at all. It says adversaries

Re: Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

#885

Post by peanuty1 »

rzz3 wrote: post #787
returningfory2 wrote: post #38

The work "ban" is in scare quotes for a reason. The law doesn't ban TikTok. Rather, it bans TikTok from having Chinese owners. If the law stands, the end result will likely be that TikTok will be sold to US owners, rather than TikTok going away. It's surprising to me that this this pretty significant distinction has been glossed over both in media reporting and in general comments here on HN. To be clear, I'm not sup…

It’s alarming to me that you think the owners of arguably the most successful social media company in the world would sell it only to appease a single country. It comes off as a typical American perspective of thinking they’re the center of the world. At TikTok’s current global growth rate, they could exceed the entire user base of the USA in just a few months. I’m not sure how that user share corresponds to revenue…

How much of their revenue comes from Europe and Asia though? American users are much more valuable than Greek or Spanish users for instance.

Re: Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

#886

Post by ChrisRR »

pkphilip wrote: post #850
gigatexal wrote: post #809

I see this as a national security threat that it is. The potential for abuse from the CCP on the minds of US users exists as does the tracking the app could do and every data point that is generated is stored and potentially useful for blackmail or otherwise on members of Congress or others. The US and its allies got rid of Chinese telecom hardware from their networks for the very same reasons now it’s time to do the…

I agree. However, banning Tiktok won't change anything. If Tiketok is banned another company will take its place. Now coming to the subject of Facebook, Twitter etc, these apps pose the same threat to nations other than the US. As in, these apps serve US interests by pushing US propaganda onto the rest of the world and constantly monitors/tracks the individuals who have these apps installed. So a better option is to…

It may not solve it, but it will change it. The amount of influence these apps have on people make them a prime target for planting and spreading misinformation.

Re: Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

#887

Post by defrost »

pineaux wrote: post #883
derelicta wrote: post #877

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CIA and FBI propaganda campaigns on US and Europe's population are however acceptable somehow.

QAnon is not really accepted.

Perhaps not broadly within the US, but certainly by a handful of U.S. congressional representatives .. and seemingly seriously to boot, not just as an affectation of convenience.

Re: Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

#888

Post by ChrisRR »

throwaway_jeff wrote: post #861
gigatexal wrote: post #809

I see this as a national security threat that it is. The potential for abuse from the CCP on the minds of US users exists as does the tracking the app could do and every data point that is generated is stored and potentially useful for blackmail or otherwise on members of Congress or others. The US and its allies got rid of Chinese telecom hardware from their networks for the very same reasons now it’s time to do the…

The problem is with the bill being legal. For example, US citizens are free to listen to chinese radio stations, or chinese TV channels, read chinese books. Why the government needs to restrict what US citizens have access to in this specific case?

Whenever these posts about limiting chinese influence pop up, a bunch of whataboutism comments against the US pop up. I'm thankful that hackernews highlights new accounts

Re: Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

#889

Post by himinlomax »

hahajk wrote: post #594
georgeecollins wrote: post #548

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A US company would never be allowed to own any kind of social media company in China. You can't own a broadcast station in the US as a non-US citizen. Rupert Murdoch had to become a US citizen to buy Fox. I don't know if I agree with this but you can't say there is no precedent for it in the US or in China.

I didn't see the parent say there was no precedent. But anyways, I like to hope that the US is better than China. If US citizens are abused while in China, I would be appalled to see Chinese citizens abused in the US as retribution.

There is absolutely no moral ambiguity in demanding fairness in trade. It's actually the highly moral position, see prisoner's dilemma.

Re: Biden signs TikTok bill into law, starting clock for ByteDance to divest

#890

Post by frontalier »

pineaux wrote: post #883
derelicta wrote: post #877

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CIA and FBI propaganda campaigns on US and Europe's population are however acceptable somehow.

QAnon is not really accepted.

gp is probably referring to hollywood type of prop not the imageboard born type
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