U.S. government consider a ban on TikTok, other Chinese social media apps

[David Matthews]

In context: The United States government has shown great skepticism of Chinese firms, particularly when it comes to technology. Secretary Pompeo's remarks highlight the ongoing tension between the U.S. and China. A TikTok ban in the U.S. could significantly hinder the social network's growth despite its insistence that it doesn't cooperate with the Chinese government.

In an interview with Fox News (via Reuters), Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that the United States is considering banning Chinese social media apps, including the uber-popular TikTok. Pompeo's statement comes as TikTok continues to face increased scrutiny over alleged ties to the Chinese government.

The U.S. government has been increasingly worried that Chinese-made apps like TikTok and tech companies like ZTE and Huawei, are points of intelligence gathering used by China.

India has shown similar national security concerns, going as far as to ban 59 Chinese-made apps including TikTok.

In response to Pompeo's remarks, a TikTok spokesman told CNBC: "TikTok is led by an American CEO, with hundreds of employees and key leaders across safety, security, product, and public policy here in the U.S. We have no higher priority than promoting a safe and secure app experience for our users. We have never provided user data to the Chinese government, nor would we do so if asked."

TikTok has reiterated that data from United States users are stored in the U.S. with backup servers in Singapore. They also claim all data centers are outside of China and aren't subject to Chinese law.

Despite TikTok's insistence of not cooperating with the Chinese government, the company has been the subject of scrutiny and more than a few privacy issues. The company was issued a $5.7 million fine for illegally collecting data from children, and its privacy policy reveals that it collects a plethora of data including keystrokes.

“We are taking this very seriously. We are certainly looking at it,” Pompeo said. “With respect to Chinese apps on peoples’ cell phones, the United States will get this one right, too.”

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/85909-us-government-consider-ban-tiktok-other-chinese-social.html

 

[SilentMarket]

They better do something about Microsoft. The Edge update **** is out of control lol.

 

[QuantumPhysics]

The US Government is "considering" nothing.

They've already decided what they are going to do. There is no "in between".

The question is whether the playstores will abide by the rules.

Technically, the government can absolutely stop you from entering federal property with Tik Tok installed, but they have no right whatsoever to stop me from using it. That falls under 1st Amendment or Private Contracts.

My guess is that they'll wait till some crime is committed on Tik Tok and then they'll step in with enforcement.

MEANWHILE several dozen suicides, homicides and fatalities can be attributed to FACEBOOK.

 

[m3diapers]

They better do something about Microsoft. The Edge update **** is out of control lol.

Yeah, my surface pro won't work with its typecover keyboard from time to time after an update this year. Microsoft's products are ready microsh!ts

 

[Uncle Al]

I rather liked that app that would identify and remove all Chinese apps, in fact I think that anyone distributing apps should identify which country they come from. I would not leave this up to the country to identify the app but make it mandatory the distributor do the identification and be held responsible for the accuracy. We are starting to do it with food, why not with our computer software?

 

[candle_86]

The US Government is "considering" nothing.

They've already decided what they are going to do. There is no "in between".

The question is whether the playstores will abide by the rules.

Technically, the government can absolutely stop you from entering federal property with Tik Tok installed, but they have no right whatsoever to stop me from using it. That falls under 1st Amendment or Private Contracts.

My guess is that they'll wait till some crime is committed on Tik Tok and then they'll step in with enforcement.

MEANWHILE several dozen suicides, homicides and fatalities can be attributed to FACEBOOK.

Not quite they can label it a danger to national security and order the isp's to block it's traffic and have it removed from us play stores.

 

[treetops]

5 min batt full smart phone chargers, 5g, tik tok... what happened to innocent until proven guilty? can't beat em ban em

 

[Shadowboxer]

I mean tik tok is obviously not our friend. But it’s popular and the US government would rather everyone was using an app made by a US tech company. So looks like we will have our data harvested by the globes dominant data harvester - a US founded company - Google. Is that better than a rogue Chinese app? Probably but it’s still a bit ****. Although I don’t plan to be on either YouTube shorts or tik tok so I don’t care really

 

[Nobonita Barua]

I think the ban should be applied from both sides. I have been long term critic of Western social media platforms. This corona is one in a life time chance & we should ban all western, specially American social media platforms, telecom equipment, computer components from our market. As I have said before, An Asian centered ,both production & market, would benefit this region & will wipe out West in less than 6 years.
We enable them with our money.Block them now.

 

[Homerlovesbeer]

I'd be happy if all social media was banned! What a refreshing change it would be for society having to interact face to face or via a phone call and it would stamp out the BS spread on it.

Perhaps the next generation may learn from the poison that is social media.

 

[m3tavision]

I think the ban should be applied from both sides. I have been long term critic of Western social media platforms. This corona is one in a life time chance & we should ban all western, specially American social media platforms, telecom equipment, computer components from our market. As I have said before, An Asian centered ,both production & market, would benefit this region & will wipe out West in less than 6 years.
We enable them with our money.Block them now.

Your post is really bizarre, because non of the western companies you mentioned, is owned by a Communist Country.

All Companies in China... are owned by Communist Party of China. All employees in China, work for CCP. The apps being used are feeding Communist China with info.

Western Corporation are not owned by a Communist Country. Therefore, their data is.for consumerism, not geopolitical advantage and spying..!

This isnt about tik-tok, this is about Communist China pretending.

 

[Nobina]

What intel can the Chinese gather from TikTok? It's a bunch of teens doing dumb faces for 5 seconds.

 

[m3tavision]

What intel can the Chinese gather from TikTok? It's a bunch of teens doing dumb faces for 5 seconds.

It what you do with your phone, while you have the App installed. It keylogs your strokes, etc..

 

[candle_86]

I think the ban should be applied from both sides. I have been long term critic of Western social media platforms. This corona is one in a life time chance & we should ban all western, specially American social media platforms, telecom equipment, computer components from our market. As I have said before, An Asian centered ,both production & market, would benefit this region & will wipe out West in less than 6 years.
We enable them with our money.Block them now.

Not quite, you loose access to standards and the ability to interface with the west, which guess what you need access to those systems for economic reasons. Making yourself incompatible with Western tech will only hurt Asia.

 

[Underdog]

Your post is really bizarre, because non of the western companies you mentioned, is owned by a Communist Country.

All Companies in China... are owned by Communist Party of China. All employees in China, work for CCP. The apps being used are feeding Communist China with info.

Western Corporation are not owned by a Communist Country. Therefore, their data is.for consumerism, not geopolitical advantage and spying..!

This isnt about tik-tok, this is about Communist China pretending.

Are you saying that the US isn't spying on its population via US controlled apps? That's OK then.

 

[Nobonita Barua]

you loose access to standards and the ability to interface with the west,

No problem

what you need access to those systems for economic reasons. Making yourself incompatible with Western tech will only hurt Asia.

Not exactly. The economic fallout will be short term. 20 years ago world had no option. Now if U.S wants to "impose" sanction, we will happily put all the green bucks in container & send it to them. In fact, we are being ready to flush out green bucks of our system so US wont have to do hard job of imposing sanction. It must be exhausting.

 

[candle_86]

No problem

Not exactly. The economic fallout will be short term. 20 years ago world had no option. Now if U.S wants to "impose" sanction, we will happily put all the green bucks in container & send it to them. In fact, we are being ready to flush out green bucks of our system so US wont have to do hard job of imposing sanction. It must be exhausting.

Yes ok, see if China becomes immune to sanctions the government has other options like seizing Chinese asset's and companies operating on American soil, they can also impose a blockade of the country to which China had no ability to respond as their Navy is still inferior to even Japan's or Frances.

Your forgetting the bigger picture, also be reminded Japan, Philippines, South Korea, India, and Tiawan very much want to keep close relations with the west, and would not side with a Chinese takeover of the global economy, China is a bully and uses it's industrial capicity to wage economic war already, that's why manufacturing is relocating slowly. China needs the west, the west doesn't need China.

 

[Impudicus]

Tiktok, google, microsoft... ISPs, the NSA... Acxiom, Corelogic, Datalogix...

 

[Mohankumar20]

China has put the whole world in trouble since Covid-19, if China has the same attitude, then it will be boycotted in the whole world.

 

[Nobonita Barua]

Yes ok, see if China becomes immune to sanctions the government has other options like seizing Chinese asset's and companies operating on American soil, they can also impose a blockade of the country to which China had no ability to respond as their Navy is still inferior to even Japan's or Frances.

You are exhausting yourself too much. Don't worry about those. Concentrate on the civil war that is coming.

China needs the west, the west doesn't need China.

You need to see the biggest picture. India, South Korea wants to keep close relation with west? Lol. Have you been actually watching what's going on over there?
You are thinking too much about China.
Its not China.
We don't need west anymore. We thank them for their world saving service. They are relived of their duty.

 

[Nobonita Barua]

China has put the whole world in trouble since Covid-19, if China has the same attitude, then it will be boycotted in the whole world.

Who is the whole world?
Speak for yourself.

 

[candle_86]

You are exhausting yourself too much. Don't worry about those. Concentrate on the civil war that is coming.

You need to see the biggest picture. India, South Korea wants to keep close relation with west? Lol. Have you been actually watching what's going on over there?
You are thinking too much about China.
Its not China.
We don't need west anymore. We thank them for their world saving service. They are relived of their duty.

Wrong again, Take a much closer look at the global economy, India and South Korea are very much tied to the west. He'll I work for an Indian company that 80% of it's bussiness is Western companies, they provide service desk and onsite kinda like Dell or CSC. I'm sure they are just dying to loose that money. Let's not forget that the companies in Asia require Western software and consumers to sell their devices at a profit. There is a reason Asian companies branch quickly into selling their items and services to the west. So you need to sit down and understand Asia's prosperity is tied to the west. You think Samsung would survive if Google stoped licensing Google apps on Android, what if Arm revoked the license to Samsung or other Asian companies. If Microsoft chose to revoke access to Windows in Asia, no it would be catastrophic for Asia, it would hurt the west to loose manufacturing but that can be replaced, we are already building new fans here in America, and Europe. Raw resources can be obtained from South America.

 

[Nobonita Barua]

Wrong again, Take a much closer look at the global economy, India and South Korea are very much tied to the west. He'll I work for an Indian company that 80% of it's bussiness is Western companies, they provide service desk and onsite kinda like Dell or CSC. I'm sure they are just dying to loose that money. Let's not forget that the companies in Asia require Western software and consumers to sell their devices at a profit. There is a reason Asian companies branch quickly into selling their items and services to the west. So you need to sit down and understand Asia's prosperity is tied to the west. You think Samsung would survive if Google stoped licensing Google apps on Android, what if Arm revoked the license to Samsung or other Asian companies. If Microsoft chose to revoke access to Windows in Asia, no it would be catastrophic for Asia, it would hurt the west to loose manufacturing but that can be replaced, we are already building new fans here in America, and Europe. Raw resources can be obtained from South America.

As I said, don't worry about the things that doesn't concern you, AND SPECIALLY, don't try to give decision on behalf of others. We know far better about SoKo & India than you do. So leave the understanding to us.
From your post I am taking you have actually never been in technology fields?
Your google stops exporting software, Samsung will get stuck. Samsung makes most of the hardware. Good luck selling your software in envelops. Entire market of west is east dependent. You stop exporting software, people here will compromise enough until local alternative arrives, regardless of quality, which will indeed take time.
Another thing, you have mentioned about the "Western" software. U.S & West isn't same. I think much of EU will disagree to follow the wannabe leader's U.S's footsteps if their economic interests gets fundamentally hurt. There is already talk coming out of EU to replace usd.
You are forgetting something very important here, the "West" might be producing software, the engineers who are writing the codes are actually mostly eastern in western companies, LOL.
Your reason is why I have been a great fan of Donald Trump. I have always said east-west complete decoupling is necessary ,demand of time AND IT WILL HAPPEN . We can choke the life out of west within year.
So I am begging you, please go ahead.
As far as economy is concerned, don't worry about us, we will be just fine.

 

[candle_86]

As I said, don't worry about the things that doesn't concern you, AND SPECIALLY, don't try to give decision on behalf of others. We know far better about SoKo & India than you do. So leave the understanding to us.
From your post I am taking you have actually never been in technology fields?
Your google stops exporting software, Samsung will get stuck. Samsung makes most of the hardware. Good luck selling your software in envelops. Entire market of west is east dependent. You stop exporting software, people here will compromise enough until local alternative arrives, regardless of quality, which will indeed take time.
Another thing, you have mentioned about the "Western" software. U.S & West isn't same. I think much of EU will disagree to follow the wannabe leader's U.S's footsteps if their economic interests gets fundamentally hurt. There is already talk coming out of EU to replace usd.
You are forgetting something very important here, the "West" might be producing software, the engineers who are writing the codes are actually mostly eastern in western companies, LOL.
Your reason is why I have been a great fan of Donald Trump. I have always said east-west complete decoupling is necessary ,demand of time AND IT WILL HAPPEN . We can choke the life out of west within year.
So I am begging you, please go ahead.
As far as economy is concerned, don't worry about us, we will be just fine.

Not really and I work it, I'm a systems engineer, and no the EU won't replace the dollar, and the people comming to America to write the code as you put it, they come here for a better life. I work with plenty of Indians and it's the same story, they had opportunity in America and the chance to escape poverty, and as I already explained Europe and the US are building fans because of how unstable China is. South Korea won't exit cooperation with the US because we are the only reason North Korea hasn't started firing missiles and artillery into the capital. We are also the only reason China hasn't invaded Tiawan because they fear our reprisals. India is closely linked with the US economy, and the government their has no interest in ending the relationship, as it's beneficial to both countries currently.

As for Europe rotating away from close cooperation with the US that will never happen either, again our economies are very deeply linked and most of Europe relies on American weapons for a large part of their defense strategy. NATO is the only thing preventing Russia from repeating Ukraine in the rest of Europe. You really need a better grasp of world politics and what actually is going on.

 

[mailpup]

Let's get back on topic and away from political diatribe please. Thanks.