The US House of Representatives is due to vote on a bill giving Chinese owner ByteDance about six months to sell that part of its business
China could use social media app TikTok to influence the 2024 US elections, the director of national intelligence, Avril Haines, has told a House of Representatives intelligence committee hearing.
Asked by Democratic Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi if China’s ruling Communist party (CCP) would use TikTok to influence the elections, Haines said “we cannot rule out that the CCP would use it”.
Lawmakers have long voiced concerns that the Chinese government could access user data or influence what people see on the app, including pushing content to stoke US political divisions.
Why only TikTok? Every social media company does the exact same thing.
This is true. Cambridge Analytica wasn’t that long ago, either.
Right? The algorithms are all designed to stoke outrage. Why don’t we do something like the EU and pass legislation that applies to all social media companies, not just demonize certain ones. What am I missing here?
I can only think that TikTok’s status as a state-affiliated company might have something to do with it being singled out.
In practice, however, other social media platforms are controlled by capital and state actors have a lot of capital to leverage, so there’s effectively no difference other than China can do for free via TikTok what Russia and the US have to pay for on any other social media platform.
What am I missing here?
Mountains of hypocrisy and xenophobia.
They want to be able to tell voters on the right that they “stood up to China and big tech” and voters on the left that they “stood up to social media companies perverting democracy” without going after the American companies that do the same things but pay them a lot more in legal bribes (and probably illegal ones too).
While other companies also have issues, TikTok goes further by having strong connection to the PRC:
Lawmakers have long voiced concerns that the Chinese government could access user data or influence what people see on the app, including pushing content to stoke US political divisions.
Oh…so it’s ok if a US company pushes political division, but if it’s a foreign company then it’s an issue?
It’s more of an issue because it’s a foreign company. For example, companies like Facebook (Meta) and Cambridge Analytica can be investigated and regulated by US agencies like the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). But they have no sway over TikTok’s developer ByteDance because it’s located outside of the US.
That’s what this bill is trying to do: force ByteDance to divest.
companies like Facebook (Meta) and Cambridge Analytica can be investigated and regulated by US agencies like the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)
They aren’t, though. Because they keep legally bribing Congress to give them more or less free rein.
You’re gunna turn into dust by the time the government regulates Meta. The only reason they care about TikTok so much is optics and the fact that a foreign company is abusing the system in the same way as the domestic social media companies. The fix isn’t to divest ByteDance, the fix is to pass actual regulation with teeth that applies to domestic and foreign companies alike.
All things being equal, yes it’s worse if it’s a foreign company.
Yes. Literally.
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Facebook, Twitter and Google are at least as obedient to the whims of the fascist Netanyahu and Modi governments (not to mention the parts of the US government that routinely violate the rights of its own citizens and people from all other countries) as Tiktok is to the Faux-Socialist totalitarian regime of China.
I don’t know why anyone downvoted you, you’re absolutely right. All of those companies are completely beholden to foreign powers. On top of that, lawmakers are saying that as long as Bytedance officially severs itself from the PRC, they can continue existing. As if that somehow means that the PRC couldn’t still use it to influence elections.
Minor correction: the companies are beholden to capital, a lot of which happens to be supplied by foreign powers. Facebook won’t create Russian propaganda, but they’ll gladly take piles of cash to host targeted misinformation from the Russian government to sway elections.
The US government seems to think that the Chinese government wouldn’t likewise just pay TikTok to host the content they want anyways.
Oh lmao you weren’t just posting this to make fun of the headline???
Because China and trade war.
America does not want non-Americans to be successful.
My guess is that they suspect that TikTok, unlike Twitter, will not help Trump.
Trump has now signaled he is against banning TikTok, so I expect any attempts to do so will fail in the House after all of his followers in Congress suddenly U-turn on their earlier stance.
The MAGA crowd is likely now going to spin this as an attempt by Biden to stifle the free market and control the messaging during the election.
Rachel Maddow just covered this.
Drumft came out for TikTok after meeting at Mag-a-Lardo with a billionaire TikTok investor.
He’s desperate for a sugar daddy to cover his half billion bar tab.
There is no bar tab. Trump doesn’t drink.
He needs a sugar daddy to cover his half billion diaper tab.
So instead we force them to sell so that some American billionaires can use it to influence elections?
That is the end goal, yes.
China, Russia, North Korea, Israel, Mark Zuckerberg, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and on and on and on… are using ALL social media (especially American social media) to influence EVERY American election for the past several years.
If it took you until now to realize that, it’s way too late.
Oh no. Only wealthy americans are allowed to control their elections.
Better wealthy citizens than a hostile foreign government.
Do you think that wealthy citizens can’t be bought off by hostile foreign governments? Neither is better - we need actual regulation rather than worrying about a single company.
Of course they can, like Musk. But they’re still under national jurisdiction. Completely different from influence by a foreign government.
The same way that Russia used Twitter and meta properties to interfere in the last few elections? And the way they will inevitably do it again in this coming election?
US legislators are incompetent and blatantly dishonest about their intentions once again.
Is America not doing the same globally with Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and others?
Hell, we already know China used Facebook to do this during the last American midterms (and has purchased all sorts of data from FB), but since they have an older user base that lawmakers figure is more likely to vote than TikTok-ers it’s not getting singled out for this special treatment
e; specified which midterms I was talking about
I’m more worried about American propaganda. America is known for supporting coups in my country.
So… Just like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Youtube? Ok
So when are those getting banned?
When the CCP takes control of them.
I’ve got bad news for you, the CCP is happy to use American social media to manipulate the populous, it doesn’t matter if it’s US owned or not.
Yes they are, but it absolutely makes a difference if it’s US-owned vs under the CCP.
China could use TikTok to influence US elections, spy chief says
Also at 11: Rupert Murdoch could use Fox News the same way.
They are crying because they can’t control narratives on the app.
Breaking news:
TV in America could be maliciously used to influence US elections.
BAN TV in America!!!
But first, Sports with Riley McGuffin. Riley?
Exactly
They could, certainly. What is the evidence that they actually are engaged in psyops campaigns though? This is a common belief but I haven’t seen a shred of evidence for it. If it exists, someone please share.
Seems to me that China could use pretty much ANY social media site to do this. Why the fixation on TikTok?
The US can’t control it. Hell, they are planning a hostile takeover after banning it, and then they will lift the ban.
A real spy master this one, with extremely keen sense of information technology, bravo man I’m really impressed
The way Russia used Facebook and Twitter?
so rather than running someone that could organically capture more of the gen z vote, they’re banning their most popular form of communication because the old man wanted another term. awesome
Yep. They don’t want to solve these problems.
They just want to make themselves and their donors richer as quickly as possible.
Anyone who doesn’t see this is a useful idiot in their scheme.
