China-owned TikTok poses a threat to us all It’s time for a hard reality check: TikTok is a national security risk, and it must be treated as such. Kyle KashuvThe Post Millennial 14th April 20203 Mins Reading At this moment, an enemy country has the ability to meddle in the United States’ domestic elections. That country is our arch foe, the People’s Republic of China, and its ruling Communist Party has the ability to do so via popular social media platform TikTok. TikTok has the facade of an innocent platform, filled with kids dancing, and lip-syncing. But TikTok has an enormous user base, with 1.5 billion downloads and 800 million active users. Those who control the levers of what can, and cannot be seen on its platform, have immense sway. TikTok is dominating Apple’s hugely popular iOS App Store, with 33 million downloads in the first quarter of 2019. It is the single most downloaded app of that quarter. Globally, 41 percent of TikTok users are between the ages of 16 and 24. ln 2019, 123.8 million people downloaded TikTok in the U.S. So tens of millions of young Americans spend countless hours there, developing their perspectives and their beliefs as they observe what they see. But it’s time for a hard reality check: TikTok is a national security risk, and it must be treated as such. In 2017 the Chinese Communist Party enacted a law stating that all Chinese companies must hand over user information and user data if requested by the Chinese government. That ought to strike us as harrowing. The threat of the Chinese Communist Party possessing millions of Americans’ data should be genuinely alarming—between their “locations, ages, private messages, phone numbers, contacts, genders, browsing histories, cell phone serial numbers, and IP addresses,” China has access to everything right at its totalitarian fingertips. So right now, China has influence over our youngest and our most susceptible. These fears might be ameliorated if TikTok had a history of ethical corporate behavior. But, between the Hong Kong protests and the oppression of China’s Uighur Muslim ethnic minority in Xinjiang province, it’s clear that TikTok censors information at the behest of its Communist Party overlords. This sets the stage for tremendous potential for information distortion in our political and electoral processes. The United States must not allow the Chinese Communist Party to have that potential influence. TikTok is a national security risk, as evidenced by the fact the U.S. Navy has already acted to halt military personnel from using it. There has been bipartisan opposition to TikTok in the Senate, too, with Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) and Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) requesting a “rigorous assessment” of the potential national security risks posed by TikTok. As reported in VOX, “The federal Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), launched an investigation into TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance.” Conveniently, the gay dating platform Grindr provides policymakers and intelligence officials alike with a clear precedent. “The gay hookup app Grindr was sold to a Chinese company called Kunlun in 2016, and in March 2019 CFIUS determined that its ownership of the US company caused a national security risk,” VOX noted. That same conclusion ought to apply to TikTok. We can expect any CFIUS investigation of TikTok to return with findings similar to those of the Grindr/Kunlun example. If TikTok doesn’t want to follow the preferred path of Grindr, which is being sold back to an American company, that’s fine. The United States should move to ban TikTok nationally. We wouldn’t let Iran, or any other enemy regime, meddle in our domestic elections. That of course also applies to the Chinese Communist Party. It is without any doubt that China has control over TikTok, has total access to all TikTok users’ data, and has been censoring information on the TikTok platform. If there’s one thing that’s been certain from the Wuhan virus global crisis, China is a horrible, deceptive, manipulative, and utterly tyrannical regime. America should be taking every step possible to minimize China’s impact and influence upon Americans citizens and our free elections. Opinion China TikTok Xi Jinping
I've already slapped my kid for even saying tic tok, so thanks for legitimizing my efforts. Ami a hero?
i would like to note once again that the growth of chinese authoritarianism is the most important story of th enext 50 years by far. global warming can suck a bag o dicks
Manish Singh@refsrc / 10:37 am CDT•June 29, 2020 Image Credits: TikTok The Indian government on Monday evening said it was banning 59 apps developed by Chinese firms over concerns that these apps were engaging in activities that threatened “national security and defence of India, which ultimately impinges upon the sovereignty and integrity of India” in what is the latest standoff between the world’s two most populated nations. Among the apps that India’s Ministry of Electronics and IT has ordered to ban include ByteDance’s TikTok, which counts India as its biggest overseas market; Community and Video Call apps from Xiaomi, which is the top smartphone vendor in India; two of Alibaba Group’s apps (UC Browser and UC News); Shareit; CM Browser, Club Factory, which claims to be India’s third-largest e-commerce firm; and ES File Explorer. This is the first time that India, the world’s second largest internet market with nearly half of its 1.3 billion population online, has ordered to ban so many foreign apps. New Delhi said nation’s Computer Emergency Response Team had received many “representations from citizens regarding security of data and breach of privacy impacting upon public order issues.” “The compilation of these data, its mining and profiling by elements hostile to national security and defence of India,” it said. The apps India is banning Tarun Pathak, an analyst at research firm Counterpoint, said the order would impact roughly one in three smartphone users in India. TikTok, Club Factory and UC Browser and other apps put together had more than 500 million monthly active users in May, according to one of the top mobile insight firms. And, 27 of these 59 apps were among the top 1,000 Android apps in India last month, according to the mobile insights firm — data of which an industry executive shared with TechCrunch. It’s unclear what exactly the “ban” means and how mobile operating system makers and internet service providers are expected to comply. At the time of writing, all of the aforementioned apps were available to download from Google Play Store and Apple’s App Store in India. Google said it had yet to receive the order from New Delhi. Apple said it was reviewing the order. The companies have traditionally complied with such app removal requests. New Delhi said it had received “many complaints from various sources, including several reports about misuse of some mobile apps available on Android and iOS platforms for stealing and surreptitiously transmitting users’ data in an unauthorized manner to servers which have locations outside India.” Monday evening’s announcement is the latest standoff between the two neighboring nations following a deadly clash at the border earlier this month that stoked historical tensions. In recent weeks, custom officials at major Indian ports and airports have halted clearances of industrial consignments coming from China. Jayanth Kolla, an analyst at research firm Convergence Catalyst, told TechCrunch the move was surprising and will have huge impact on Chinese firms, many of which count India as their biggest market. He said banning these apps would also hurt the livelihood of several Indians who directly or indirectly work for them. Anti-China sentiment has been gaining mindshare in India in recent weeks, since more than 20 Indian soldiers were killed in a military clash in the Himalayas earlier this month. “Boycott China” — and variations of it — has been trending on Twitter in India ever since as a growing number of people posted videos demonstrating destruction of Chinese-made smartphones, TVs and other products. Chinese smartphone makers command more than 80% of the smartphone market in India, which is the world’s second largest. For SoftBank-backed TikTok, which has more than 200 million monthly active users in India, New Delhi’s move is its latest headache. The Chinese firm has also faced scrutiny in Europe and the United States in recent quarters. TikTok has been facing backlash in India since the second half of May after users unearthed and shared numerous recent TikTok videos on Twitter that appeared to promote domestic violence, animal cruelty, racism, child abuse and objectification of women. Many in India rushed to leave a poor rating of the TikTok app in the Google Play Store to express their disgust — and the Android-maker had to intervene and delete millions of comments. Days later, an app called “Remove China Apps” gained popularity among some Indians. Google pulled the app later from the Play Store citing it violated its guidelines. A TikTok spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In April, India amended its foreign direct investment policy to require all neighboring nations, including China, with which it shares a boundary to seek approval from New Delhi for their future investments in India. The nation’s Department of Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade said it was taking this measure to “curb the opportunistic takeover” of Indian firms that are grappling with challenges due to the coronavirus crises. When TikTok app was blocked in India for a week last year, ByteDance had said in a court filing that it was losing more than $500,000 a day in the nation. So, after IOS latest release, people just randomly noticed an exploit in the clipboard info being read by tiktok/huawei. found by accident. odds are anything huawei has all your accounts info and your contacts via sms or email or any other app. big problem here boys. dont buy china.
unlike russia, which is white, china has aw huge advantage. they will always use our childish nature about race against us. we are pussies about race. any accusation of racism wins any argument. we cant even fucking have white people play black cartoon characters. they managed to push to have viruses not named after the place they came from anymore. we dont call it the wuhan flu because of chinese pressure in the WHO and our media, and also the white folks here that unknowingly serve them
https://www.dnaindia.com/world/repo...tican-2-billion-annually-to-keep-shut-2830054 Dissident claims Chinese Communist Party pays Vatican $2 billion annually to keep shut
as is oftn the case, shaq is the only man that knows anything. when the whole hong kong NBA thing went down, and al the players were sucking china's cock on command from the NBA/espn/disney, shaq said "Daryl Morey was right. Whenever you see something wrong going on anywhere in the world, you should have the right to say 'that's not right' and that's what [Morey] did. you might think i am just praising shaq because i love LSU basketball etc. nah man. no other celebrities were saying this. shaq dont give a fuck.
Benedict Rogers 羅傑斯 @benedictrogers The #NationalSecurityLaw imposed by Beijing on #HongKong is more outrageous than expected Not only does it impose life sentences It also potentially makes me & my colleagues "criminals" Article 38 says non-HK citizens not even in HK can be deemed to have violated this Law!
