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

To me the real national security threat is that Americans don't know how to use social media safely.

> The potential for abuse from the CCP on the minds of US users exists

The exact same way Facebook and other U.S. social networks abuse the minds of US users.[1]

> 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.

Yep, and in a similar way every large US player hoards as much data about its users as it can get away with, even if it doesn't know what it'll do with it, and eventually loses said data in a giant breach, which can lead to blackmail, etc.[2]

And here we sit, either toothlessly regulating the U.S. actors or attempting to ban the foreign ones instead of teaching people how to actually use social media in a way that helps them instead of melting their brains and exposing their deepest secrets to malicious actors.

I'm not much of a capitalist or a social darwinist but I'd say the best thing to do is let people learn the hard way. We seem cool to do that with junk food,[3][4] and the similarities in social engineering between the social media and junk food are striking.

[1] https://www.chicagotribune.com/2023/08/11/waukegan-district-...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_data_breaches

[3] https://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/24/magazine/the-extraordinar...

[4] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21999689/

This whole subject of blocking Tiktok raises the question as to why companies such as Bytedance aren't punished as malicious actors when the data being captured by them is clearly meant for malicious use.

We really should have a way of judging if any data being captured by an app is in good faith or if it is being done in a clearly fraudulent or malicious manner and then punish or shutdown the malicious operators. Tiktok has been proven to be manipulative and also as an arm of the CCP.

However, what about other apps which seem to capture data that makes no sense to them?

For example, if your note taking app is secretly uploading data from your contact list - that should be clearly seen as malicious in comparison to say your e-commerce app storing details about your purchase history made on that app to determine what may be going on with you.

Even the second part is a bit shady but at least you can make a case that it may be just a way to sell more things.

But many apps capture data that cannot make any business sense to the company behind that app other than being something quite malicious - like for example:

- Uber secretly recording your screen on iphone EVEN WHILE the app was NOT EVEN BEING USED using API which Apple conveniently did not disclose to anyone else other than Uber and perhaps other shady operators!

- Chrome caught secretly sending audio transcripts back to the Google servers. Why would a browser need to send audio transcripts by secretly tapping into the microphone?

- Nest using microphones which were only revealed much later. Why would a smoke alarm need audio?

- Why do apps like Whatsapp - even in the web version, secretly take the data from the clipboard (copy buffer)? Why would an app need the data in the clipboard before it is even pasted into it?

Any company capturing or using such data should be required to provide evidence that this data was captured for a legitimate reason - and be punished if they are not able to provide this data with the principals of the company being treated like organized crime operators. Anything else is just pointless.

Ok but even if I accept all that, what does it have to do with TikTok specifically?

I feel like all these arguments just come down to “China bad, therefore anything that annoys China is good” which is silly and juvenile reasoning

You are attempting to link Russia invading Ukraine with TikTok? I’d love to see the chain of reasoning here.

Yes, but you think that possibility of government oversight/monitoring is an inherent necessity for government permitting any kind of media to operate in the US?

If doesn't work in many cases anyway, Government has no way to track who is tuning in and listening to hostile radio broadcasts.

Even it might be hostile propaganda, First ammendment protects both publishing and consuming content, without any "national security" considerations. But US lawmakers are now seemingly keen to introduce such conditions in the publishing and consuming of content.

During the cold war it was perfectly legal for the Soviet Life magazine to be published in the US and for people to buy and read it.

First ammendment really does say that "Congress shall make no law .." without any caveats for national security or even war-time exemptions.

It will be interesting to see how it plays out in the SCOTUS.