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Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

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161–170 of 677 posts

Re: Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

#161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so is just saying the words "national security" enough for you to believe that this is justified? should the US government be allowed to block any private company from doing business just by saying those magic words, with no further justification? or just any foreign-owned company? or just any chinese company - if it's china, what makes china special? there's got to be some limitation on where you draw the line on th…

Foreign controlled seems like a very clear dividing line that greatly limits abuse. It helps that unlike China, the United States has judicial review.

If you're saying that no company controlled by foreign nationals should be allowed to do business in the US, that is absolutely a sharp, consistent dividing line.

I don't think you're saying that, though.

Re: Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

#162
post #138
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let’s not pretend this is anything other than just plain old geopolitics with TikTok caught in the middle. Going by “national security” reasons most countries should ban Facebook and google, not to mention amazon, Microsoft, oracle, Cisco etc. since the us government has already shown willingness and ability to spy on anything they can get their hands on, including foreign heads of state. Allowing US controlled socia…

Many countries including China do block US companies on national security grounds. National security is very much a double edged sword.

Of course the US isn’t the only country that plays this game. The government also needs to justify it some how, and I don’t even blame them for that. But at least here we can stop pretending there is some sort of objective, consistently applied standard at play.

Re: Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

#163
post #138
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let’s not pretend this is anything other than just plain old geopolitics with TikTok caught in the middle. Going by “national security” reasons most countries should ban Facebook and google, not to mention amazon, Microsoft, oracle, Cisco etc. since the us government has already shown willingness and ability to spy on anything they can get their hands on, including foreign heads of state. Allowing US controlled socia…

Many countries including China do block US companies on national security grounds. National security is very much a double edged sword.

US companies operating in China need to follow Chinese laws, including those on censorship. Google etc are blocked because they are hosted outside China, and are not willing to cooperate in China.

What I find bizarre about the Tiktok ban is that they are being banned essentially on executive whim: as far as I can tell, there are no concrete allegations, much less evidence, that they're violating any US laws.

Re: Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

#164

Pornhub is a foreign company, perhaps Trump should ban that too. It could be a national security threat for a foreign company to know the porn habits of government officials, they could use that to blackmail military generals and the like. /sarcasm

This is a poor argument, including the sarcasm. Pornhub is a Canadian company. Last time I checked, Canada was still a democratic country with an ideology roughly aligned with that of the US.

Re: Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

#165
post #33
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a valid concern but the administration's approach is heavy-handed and impractical. They seem intent on simply stealing a successful company from China and letting american companies earn the rewards and maybe get a kickback in the process. They should use either their national security powers or, better yet, an act of Congress to ban the specific objectionable activities and let the markets sort themselves ou…

I'm sure it's not a coincidence that one of the biggest western social media apps - Instagram - launched a direct clone of tiktok. So far IG reels are dead but if TikTok gets banned there's an undeniable benefit for IG, right?

It very likely isn't a coincidence as the main manager of Instagram has been lobbying for the ban of TikTok.

Re: Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

#166
post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The KGB already did this in 2016 and the White House conveniently doesn't care and actually vehemently denies anything happened. Now, in the lead up to an election, suddenly they care about foreign intervention of elections? Or is it more likely that Donald Trump is just trying to tally as many "wins" as possible in the lead up an election like any politician would? The CCP already compromised our technology supply c…

Minor nitpick, but the KGB didn't exist in 2016, that would be FSB. Unless you are referring to Belarus, which does have a KGB.

Generally, Russiagaters think that the KGB still exists, and that the USSR never fell.

Re: Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

#167
post #126

It's strange how so many in the US have adopted the mindset that it's important, for national security, to deny its citizens access to foreign social networks. Previously, when China did the same, this was widely viewed as an unfortunate restriction their freedoms -- the actions of an intrusive, authoritarian government. Now that the US is itself considering doing the same, many in the west have suddenly adopted the…

I have not read detailed reports, but just HN commentary and the reddit post that revealed the amount of data collected from phones.

Trump's narcissism notwithstanding, the natsec issue with these apps isn't that US citizens are communicating with others, including foreigners. It is that they are installing what may very well be Chinese government spyware on their phones, with detailed tracking and keylogging.

FWIW it would be interesting to keep an eye on what kind of permissions and access some of these PC gaming platforms have to peoples' workstations, as well.

Re: Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

#168
post #32

It's a national security issue. Plus, if you sue the government order from any courts in CA, you will win anyways these days. CA is too liberal to remain in US, I remember they were saying CA-Independence from USA after 2016, I can't wait to support it, but those people somehow did not proceed, very disappointed.

I don't think most Americans would be too keen to forfeit 15% of the country's GDP [1] to own the libs. [1] https://www.statista.com/chart/9358/us-gdp-by-state-and-regi...

Ironically, secession of California would have Xi Jinping pouring champagne. How does abdicating to China to own the libs sound?

Re: Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

#169
post #153
post #126

It's strange how so many in the US have adopted the mindset that it's important, for national security, to deny its citizens access to foreign social networks. Previously, when China did the same, this was widely viewed as an unfortunate restriction their freedoms -- the actions of an intrusive, authoritarian government. Now that the US is itself considering doing the same, many in the west have suddenly adopted the…

The US is a democratic government with the rule of law, as seen in this very example with a judge blocking the order.

The US is a democratic government with the rule of law, as seen in the case of slavery.

Re: Judge temporarily blocks U.S. ban on TikTok downloads from U.S. app stores

#170
post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This whole shift to China as the new "enemy" is fascinating. Even though Trump is more or less mental, and is recognised as such, he has somehow managed to whip up this new cold war frenzy even among his opponents in the media. I can barely remember any focus on China before Trump. Not saying that there shouldn't be any but it's still interesting how this can spread to the entire country even if the author is an untr…

> I can barely remember any focus on China before Trump. Maybe not in the mass media, but the new cold war preceded Trump as an issue. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Asian_foreign_policy_of_t...

Sure, but now it's at a level where arbitrarily banning Chinese products barely meet resistence from the opposition and media.
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