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This is both terrifying and deeply, deeply stupid.
This isn't just about TikTok. The bill gives USG the power to ban any old foreign-owned media/tech they designate as adversarial.
https://apnews.com/article/tiktok-ban-house-vote-china-national-security-8fa7258fae1a4902d344c9d978d58a37?taid=65f1bb38c2c1680001c4da1b&utm_campaign=TrueAnthem&utm_medium=AP&utm_source=Twitter
This, at a time when we're facing a second Trump term, when we're already seeing alarming censorship & limits on expression (book banning, LGBTQ resources, etc.) at the state level, where a McCarthy-era environment is in effect for pro-Palestinian speech...
If this were about privacy & security, then they'd be targeting Facebook, Instagram, etc as well. But they're not. This's about control & I'm not ok with ANY government exercising such control, particularly (as the US here) over the 'rest of world' via US-homed Big Tech platforms
@Mer__edith If it is about protecting data of US persons, why aren't they going after Lexis/Nexis and other data brokers?
Could it be this?
I get the privacy concerns about TikTok, but it's not as if China can't just buy very similar data on the open market.
If it was about privacy, perhaps they should crack down on THAT...
The propaganda possibilities provided by putting the thumb of the scale of the amplification algorithms is to me the more worrisome aspects of TikTok (and X, Meta, Google, etc)
@austegard @Mer__edith This is what I keep saying, Meta can sell your data to a data broker who can turn around and sell it to China! This does not solve the problem of China getting your data! But a lot of folks who are like “TikTok is owned by the Yellow Peril country” don’t want to hear it
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@Mer__edith@mastodon.world It's a known fack that US Intelligence community are buying data from ad company and data brokers, so they couldn't have wanted to care abt people's privacy, otherwise it'd be trying to blindfold themselves.
@Mer__edith It's also just part of the anti-China hysteria that is liable to land us in a really big war sooner or later. We need to de-escalate this thing before we wipe out the planet.
@Mer__edith I don't understand the distinction. Much of privacy is about control...
@avoidthehack but not all control is about privacy
@Mer__edith Agree with everything but Palestinian discourse. Fuck them and everyone who supports them at expense of everyone else (LGBTQ+, activists, jews, christians)
@Mer__edith won't tiktok just open an American office/headquarters?
@lathamgreen they already have one. And Oracle handles their data in the US.
@lathamgreen @Mer__edith The idea of this is to get some right-wing nut job to buy it and do to it what Musk did to Twitter.
@MisuseCase @Mer__edith i was thinking the same thing, someone to pull a "Twitterpocalypse"
@lathamgreen @Mer__edith Or to actually do with young people on the platform what they accuse China of doing with young people.
@Mer__edith Not that they didn't have that power since #FARA was enacted.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Agents_Registration_Act
In fact, they did use that to ban #CRI from acquiring #RadioStations in the #USA and deny permits for transmissions & broadcasts after the cover was blown...
https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/china-radio/
https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKCN0SR2AI/
https://www.opensecrets.org/fara/registrants/G103646
@Mer__edith it also opens the door for the EU to do the same.
Ban or sell offiice365, facebook, twitter you name it
@Mer__edith Hmmm..... Like Meta (Failbook, Messenger, WhatsApp, Instagram, Threads), Google, Amazon, Microsoft, etc. are beholden to the American government?
I'm anyway convinced that all EU governenmental and public services should be banned from using their services.
But, too many still don't grasp the "foreign or domestic" clause.
@Mer__edith it's so stupid that a House that only passed 28 bills last year decided this needed to be a top priority.
@Mer__edith how will they ban tiktok? great firewall of America?