TikTok furor is just cover to advance the national security state. Meet the Restrict Act.

[WhatTheBuck 28713]

4 hours ago, Blotto said:

Maybe its a naïve question, but as someone that doesn't use the platform at all, every time I see it embedded in other websites, its basically stupid shit (dances, challenges, dipshit rants, attention mongering....basically the same stupid shit that occupies all social media.

 

[F250 28691]

5 hours ago, Blotto said:

the move to ban TikTok simply a protectionist "only US companies have the right to monitor and exploit our citizens, and foreign governments shall not also participate in the fuckery unless they pay US companies first" policy. Because we know foreign actors are all over US social media sites today spreading propaganda, misinformation, etc... Shuttering Tiktok aint gonna do a damn thing to fix that. 

This.

The TikTok fear mongering is just obfuscation so American tech companies can continue to harvest and monetize personal data.

[Smax 3800]

36 minutes ago, F250 said:

This.

The TikTok fear mongering is just obfuscation so American tech companies can continue to harvest and monetize personal data.

 

 

Once again, this isnt about harvesting data, that is a very simplistic way of looking at this

Edited March 28, 2023 by Smax

[F250 28691]

27 minutes ago, Smax said:

 

 

Once again, this isnt about harvesting data, that is a very simplistic way of looking at this

Everything other than the data privacy issue is a red herring.

 

[Smax 3800]

14 hours ago, F250 said:

Everything other than the data privacy issue is a red herring.

 

Anyone who thinks this is about data privacy cant see the threes through the forest

[Fastbreak 3959]

This.
The TikTok fear mongering is just obfuscation so American tech companies can continue to harvest and monetize personal data.

TikTok and their Chinese CEO from the clearly communist province of Singapore.

[F250 28691]

1 hour ago, Smax said:

Anyone who thinks this is about data privacy cant see the threes through the forest

Are you concerned about a foreign nation micro targeting U.S. citizens with disinformation or a psyops campaign? You do realize that it's the user data that is collected that allows this? See the Cambridge Analytica scandal as an example.

Unfortunately the CA/FB scandal went down before GDPR kicked in otherwise their fines would have been a lot higher. What is interesting is that the E.U. recognizes that GDPR needs to be modified more to be a deterrent to another CA/FB scandal. So they are currently working on revisioning GDPR. They have been fine tuning this for nearly 30 years going back the the DPD.

Meanwhile, here we are in the U.S. without any basic standards regarding data privacy we are sticking our thumbs up our ass cheering on a solution that isn't a fix.

Edited March 28, 2023 by F250

[Fastbreak 3959]

When we have many US congresspeople straight up lying and spreading hate/falsehoods every day on twitter and other platforms and a major network basically being a Putin mouthpiece, excuse me for not worrying too much about TikTok.

[NameAlreadyInUse 5106]

21 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:

TikTok is now the preferred search engine for 13-25 year olds in the U.S. If they want to know something, they don’t Google it— they TikTok it. If you can’t see the potential for exploitation by a hostile foreign power, I don’t know what to tell you. 
 

TikTok is also collecting vast amounts of biometric data, preferences, psychological profiles, and using that information to develop cognitive weapons. They don’t hide that they are investing in this. 
 

 

And Facebook is the preferred search engine for the olds.  I see the potential for exploitation, in fact I've been watching it going on for a good long while right here with US based companies as well, and I think Facebook is playing a major role (along with Fox) in why so many of us have lost our parents to the cult of the GOP. I don't really see the thing you are concerned about being different because I've already watched Facebook sell to whoever wanted to buy it, including foreign governments.  So why should I care if I'm lining the pockets of some Singaporean CEO vs Zuckerberg if the end result is that governments against the US are still going to wind up with the same data? 

What I'm getting at is that if we're going to be banning social media from China, then we should be banning Facebook from selling data to non-US citizens, and banning US citizens from sending that information outside the borders of the US.  If we're not ALSO doing that, then China will just buy the data from Facebook and carry on with their plans unabated.  If the data is what's important, then we should be protecting the data, no matter how it is collected.  It's as simple as that.  Until such time as we decide to protect the data no matter where it's being collected, I don't really understand the picking of winners and losers among the data collectors.  That really shouldn't be the business of our government.

[956 Worldwide 34444]

It can be simultaneously true that we need more robust data protection, more comprehensive action against domestic disinformation, and that TikTok represents a unique national security threat that should be addressed even as we debate the other two things. 
 

I would have hoped that the experience we’ve seen with Russia had taught the educated body politic to believe authoritarian regimes when they tell you their intentions but it appears we haven’t. China is not hiding the ball with their intentions, they are adversarial and want to weaken the United States and strengthen themselves at our expense. Believing them on TikTok requires the same sort of willful delusion as believing “Nord Stream 2 is a purely commercial project.”
 

It’s really fascinating to see how ready we are to lie to ourselves— virtually all of us can accept the general hypothesis that the PRC is not our friend and that it wants to create a world more like China as as opposed to China becoming more open.  But we pretend that the specifics are somehow different. “Sure, we want to destroy you and use your own institutions against you, yes. That’s all laid out in our strategic documents. But TikTok, Huawei, graduate students that form United Front on campus, secret police stations in your cities, farm purchases, buying movie studios- that’s not part of it! That’s all innocent!” 
 

The very fact that so many educated Americans are ready to believe that there’s no real difference or implication to their well being and security between a Beijing-based or San Jose based company controlling their data is solid evidence that we have a broken collective IFF system. 

 

Edited March 28, 2023 by 956 Worldwide

[Smax 3800]

1 hour ago, F250 said:

Are you concerned about a foreign nation micro targeting U.S. citizens with disinformation or a psyops campaign? You do realize that it's the user data that is collected that allows this? See the Cambridge Analytica scandal as an example.

Unfortunately the CA/FB scandal went down before GDPR kicked in otherwise their fines would have been a lot higher. What is interesting is that the E.U. recognizes that GDPR needs to be modified more to be a deterrent to another CA/FB scandal. So they are currently working on revisioning GDPR. They have been fine tuning this for nearly 30 years going back the the DPD.

Meanwhile, here we are in the U.S. without any basic standards regarding data privacy we are sticking our thumbs up our ass cheering on a solution that isn't a fix.

 

The targeting of U.S. citizens with disinformation is a psyops campaign, I disagree about fines being higher if GDPR was in effect simply due to the cozy relationship between US intelligence agencies and US based social media companies. We saw the hearings after the CA/FB scandal but once the cameras were turned off and behind closed doors the intelligence committee told FB/Google/Twitter as long as you keep feeding us info its business as usual, quid pro quo type arrangement. If you look back over the past 15-20 years almost every "bad guy" we've caught and or killed was due to some information from a social media company, Google/FB/Insta/Twitter/Tiktok are the ultimate espionage tool and we and china would be fools not to use it.

My assertion about the data not being the issue, statements about china building dossiers on all us citizens, social scores whatever, who cares all that info is already out there. What worries me is the manipulation of information/news. The numbers vary depending on source but I think we can all agree that upwards of 70% of people under the age of 25 in this country get their news from tiktok. It went from an ap with viral dancing, cinnamon challenge and thirst traps to now its a news source with no ties to US law. They can state anything they want and there is minimal to no recourse for blatant lies to users. Example, when Pelosi visited Taiwan last year, the majority of videos about this talked about it in a negative light. Media manipulation to 100 million + US citizen by a country that is our enemy is not good.

 

China doesn't allow google facebook or twtiter in china, we shouldn't allow tiktok in the us. if they want it here have the company sale it, cash in their billons and let us manipulate our citizens with our own message 

[F250 28691]

2 minutes ago, Smax said:

 

The targeting of U.S. citizens with disinformation is a psyops campaign, I disagree about fines being higher if GDPR was in effect simply due to the cozy relationship between US intelligence agencies and US based social media companies. We saw the hearings after the CA/FB scandal but once the cameras were turned off and behind closed doors the intelligence committee told FB/Google/Twitter as long as you keep feeding us info its business as usual, quid pro quo type arrangement. If you look back over the past 15-20 years almost every "bad guy" we've caught and or killed was due to some information from a social media company, Google/FB/Insta/Twitter/Tiktok are the ultimate espionage tool and we and china would be fools not to use it.

My assertion about the data not being the issue, statements about china building dossiers on all us citizens, social scores whatever, who cares all that info is already out there. What worries me is the manipulation of information/news. The numbers vary depending on source but I think we can all agree that upwards of 70% of people under the age of 25 in this country get their news from tiktok. It went from an ap with viral dancing, cinnamon challenge and thirst traps to now its a news source with no ties to US law. They can state anything they want and there is minimal to no recourse for blatant lies to users. Example, when Pelosi visited Taiwan last year, the majority of videos about this talked about it in a negative light. Media manipulation to 100 million + US citizen by a country that is our enemy is not good.

 

China doesn't allow google facebook or twtiter in china, we shouldn't allow tiktok in the us. if they want it here have the company sale it, cash in their billons and let us manipulate our citizens with our own message 

The fines would have been higher because those were E.U. regulations that were violated. Facebook was fined in the E.U. but under the regulations that preceded GDPR and the fines were significantly lower under DPD.

I've been in the industry (security side) for over twenty years and have seen how European data is treated compared to U.S. data. A lot more effort is always put into protecting the Euro's while minimal amount goes into protecting Americans. Simply because GRC people are monitoring what we do with E.U. data to prevent breaking regulations.

Once again, if your concern is micro targeting than you need to remove the ability for these platforms to target users.

I do think that Project Texas is a workable solution without the need to ban TikTok. Granted, it would be really helpful if we actually had data regulations here in the U.S.

[smuggs 9342]

2 hours ago, F250 said:

Meanwhile, here we are in the U.S. without any basic standards regarding data privacy we are sticking our thumbs up our ass cheering on a solution that isn't a fix.

 

[Captainant 27467]

45 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

The very fact that so many educated Americans are ready to believe that there’s no real difference or implication to their well being and security between a Beijing-based or San Jose based company controlling their data is solid evidence that we have a broken collective IFF system. 

Well to be clear, it's not that I think "there's no difference between a Chinese owned and American owned company collecting data". It's more that I trust that neither of those entities give a singular fuck about my individual well-being or what is good or bad for society. Neither of them collecting THAT MUCH data on EVERYONE is going to lead to good things. 

So yeah sure, the Chinese companies want to subvert our society for geopolitical gains, but the American companies want to subvert our society for financial gain. 

If you go about your life with the expectation of domestic corporations being your friends, you're going to end up dying as a wage slave in a company town

[Smax 3800]

25 minutes ago, F250 said:

 

Once again, if your concern is micro targeting than you need to remove the ability for these platforms to target users.

 

I have no issue with that, infact I think ALL social media should be banned in the US, they are not a net positive. Not going to happen I know but it will be the down fall of society as we know it and I'm not speaking in hyperbole. We are witnessing it now, we are being torn apart internally by foreign actors and it's going to get much much worse

[WhatTheBuck 28713]

2 hours ago, Fastbreak said:

When we have many US congresspeople straight up lying and spreading hate/falsehoods every day on twitter and other platforms and a major network basically being a Putin mouthpiece, excuse me for not worrying too much about TikTok.

Some of us can walk and chew gum at the same time. 

[DaysOff 7853]

TikTok is awesome. There's so many funny, creative, and informative people out there producing content plus chicks shaking their tits. Oh noes, those sneaky Chinese know I like chicks shaking their tits. The rest of my data? The Google bros have a had that for decades. Get a grip FNC watchers.

[WhatTheBuck 28713]

It was so tough living life without being able to see chicks shaking their tits before TikTok finally came along. How did we ever manage to get by?

[MonkeyDoughnut 10145]

The bills wide reach and ability for the govt to go after/meddle in VPN services is concerning to say the least.  At least with TikTok they are directly owning the fact that we will enforce internet censorship just like... well... China does.

[Fastbreak 3959]

These are the same people that don’t shit about tech trying to make rules about tech.

It’s how we got to the point of having to chose to allow cookies in every fucking site.

[pyrohornIII 4809]

Rand Paul is taking a stand against it.  Not for the fact it could impinge 1A, but he's scared the youth might never forgive the Rs for it.   And there is something to that.  My son told me its quite the topic on campus, the students are riled up about it.  

I've been using TT for over a year and really enjoy it.  There's some shitty content, but also a lot of good stuff.  And it's not just kids either.    There are some pretty sharp folks on there.   There's more to this than fear of Chinese influences.  I think its more a fear of common people (particularly youth) having an unadulterated platform to spread information.   

 

 

[Captainant 27467]

4 hours ago, pyrohornIII said:

I think its more a fear of common people (particularly youth) having an unadulterated platform to spread information.   

And ya know, that we've had multiple election cycles in a row in which social media was used by an adversary nation to stoke domestic unrest. That's a pretty reasonable fear, IMO

[Neonmoon 38127]

I’m not blaming TikTok, but social media in general. I was at the doctors office, and the front desk person started a conversation. Somehow got to taxes. She said, “I saw some TikTok videos that said there’s no actual law that we have to pay taxes”. After that warm wave of sovereign citizen stupidity washed over me, I told her yes, there are laws about paying taxes. Probably be a good idea to continue doing that 

[F250 28691]

If the RESTRICT Act passes it will empower the Secretary of Commerce to regulate it while it contains somewhat vague wording about jailing Americans.

Our last Secretary of Commerce was that whackadoo Wilbur Ross. Sounds like a good idea.

 

 

[HamsterHookah 112]

One of my all time favorite explanations of Tik Tok which I've shared before is from that venerable Cosby-killer, Hannibal Burress:

Q) Hannibal, How would you explain TikTok to your great-grandparents?
A) A record player but it keeps skipping and it’s a video and it’s Chinese face-scanning software.

[HamsterHookah 112]

Apparently TikTok has back up plans: https://techcrunch.com/2023/03/28/tiktok-ban-backup-plan-bytedance-owned-instagram-rival-lemon8-hits-the-u-s-app-stores-top-10/

Lemon8, the TikTok alternative made by…TikTok parent company ByteDance has cracked the US App Store’s Top 10 list as lawmakers mull banning TikTok

[Horn Under a Bad Sign 20345]

Screw the Chinese. I am going to leave my personal data, content etc... in the hands of [Cambridge Analytica] Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk, where it's safe [/Cambridge Analytica]!

Edited March 30, 2023 by Horn Under a Bad Sign

[Captainant 27467]

1 hour ago, HamsterHookah said:

One of my all time favorite explanations of Tik Tok which I've shared before is from that venerable Cosby-killer, Hannibal Burress:

Q) Hannibal, How would you explain TikTok to your great-grandparents?
A) A record player but it keeps skipping and it’s a video and it’s Chinese face-scanning software.

 

52 minutes ago, Horn Under a Bad Sign said:

Screw the Chinese. I am going to leave my personal data, content etc... in the hands of [Cambridge Analytica] Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk, where it's safe [/Cambridge Analytica]!

Yeah for real in terms of face scanning, facebook has an incredible corpus of labeled data for facial recognition from decades of pictures with friends tagged in them. Facebook/meta OWNS that data and has a pretty good idea of what people look like over time, in a variety of different settings, and with a variety of different imaging technologies. It's basically the starter kit for a hell of a facial recognition model.

And to reiterate, meta OWNS that data, and they can do whatever the fuck they want with it - including sell it to governments (both foreign and domestic), companies (read: advertisers), or even bounty hunters and private-eye's.

There's no laws to restrict or regulate anything like that. 

 

Yes, we need to do something about tiktok. But targeting only them isn't gonna fix the above issue with facebook/meta. Frankly, all of the algorithmically driven social medias are badly in need of personal privacy guardrails and regulation.

[BurntOrange&White 39665]

So many of yall are bafoons and not realizing this isn't about TikTok, this is about giving government direct access to your information.

 

And none of yall find it odd that TikTok is some big bad issue that somehow both sides can come together so overwhelmingly about? You're fools.

[HamsterHookah 112]

30 minutes ago, BurntOrange&White said:

So many of yall are bafoons and not realizing this isn't about TikTok, this is about giving government direct access to your information.

 

And none of yall find it odd that TikTok is some big bad issue that somehow both sides can come together so overwhelmingly about? You're fools.

From what I can tell, the only people who aren't in agreement that TikTok needs to be regulated and/or banned are young naïve people who love to consume TikTok and/or TikTok influencers and people who stand to gain from TikTok.

Everyone else is just arguing the nuances, it seems.

[BurntOrange&White 39665]

4 minutes ago, HamsterHookah said:

From what I can tell, the only people who aren't in agreement that TikTok needs to be regulated and/or banned are young naïve people who love to consume TikTok and/or TikTok influencers and people who stand to gain from TikTok.

Everyone else is just arguing the nuances, it seems.

You puppets being manipulated by politicians thinking this about Tiktok is laughable. That shit is run through Oracle, they're moving all their servers/data collection to Texas. learn ya self on it before you choose.

[F250 28691]

1 hour ago, BurntOrange&White said:

You puppets being manipulated by politicians thinking this about Tiktok is laughable. That shit is run through Oracle, they're moving all their servers/data collection to Texas. learn ya self on it before you choose.

I don't believe the data will actually reside in Texas. As far as I am aware, Oracle cloud doesn't have a presence in Texas. They have a big data center in Austin but that isn't part of their cloud Infrastructure. I suspect Virginia is where it will reside since that's Oracle's primary cloud region in the U.S.

 

[BurntOrange&White 39665]

11 minutes ago, F250 said:

I don't believe the data will actually reside in Texas. As far as I am aware, Oracle cloud doesn't have a presence in Texas. They have a big data center in Austin but that isn't part of their cloud Infrastructure. I suspect Virginia is where it will reside since that's Oracle's primary cloud region in the U.S.

 

TikTok is working to build their data servers in Texas. Currently it all goes through Oracle. The CEO from Singapore who went in front of Congress provided a ton of information between the typical grandstanding and retardation of US politiicans. 

Edited March 30, 2023 by BurntOrange&White

[F250 28691]

1 minute ago, BurntOrange&White said:

TikTok is working to build their data servers in Texas. Currently it all goes through Oracle.

Interesting, I read reports that TikTok will be using OCI but I just now read an interview that said they will be using Oracle Bare Metal cloud services instead.

 

[WhatTheBuck 28713]

12 hours ago, pyrohornIII said:

Rand Paul is taking a stand against it.  Not for the fact it could impinge 1A, but he's scared the youth might never forgive the Rs for it.   And there is something to that.  My son told me its quite the topic on campus, the students are riled up about it.  

I've been using TT for over a year and really enjoy it.  There's some shitty content, but also a lot of good stuff.  And it's not just kids either.    There are some pretty sharp folks on there.   There's more to this than fear of Chinese influences.  I think its more a fear of common people (particularly youth) having an unadulterated platform to spread information.   

 

 

They don’t have that with Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter?

[Smax 3800]

4 minutes ago, WhatTheBuck said:

They don’t have that with Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter?

They do and a few more aps not listed, and for the comment above about this not being about china but our government having access to our data. They already do

Every communication you send via your phone or computer our government has, they have the facial scans for iphone users and iris scans from those, the finger prints of andriod users. All your info is in a numbered file on a server in Bluffdale Utah

[Mullet Free 40]

This clip is hilarious. I guess Watters did a monologue leading into this about how the Restrict act is unconstitutional, expands executive power yada yada. Graham caught off guard when he finds out he’s cosponsoring it. Also, don’t worry Lindsey they already access your private phone. That’s how they twist your arm and get you to support all kinds of ridiculous shit. 
 

 

On 3/30/2023 at 8:04 AM, F250 said:

If the RESTRICT Act passes it will empower the Secretary of Commerce to regulate it while it contains somewhat vague wording about jailing Americans.

Our last Secretary of Commerce was that whackadoo Wilbur Ross. Sounds like a good idea.

 

 

Exactly. Appears to give vague powers to the Executive branch to broadly RESTRICT American’s internet usage. They could’ve just written a simple bill to eliminate the app from app stores. 
 

The authors really fell down on the job of naming this one btw. Restrict act is too accurate. Should’ve been the Taking Back Our Internet from Commie China Act. 

[pyrohornIII 4809]

On 3/30/2023 at 1:58 PM, WhatTheBuck said:

They don’t have that with Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter?

All those work differently and have different purposes and regulations.  It's not as simple as one brand vs the other like Chevy vs Lexus.  It's more about how they work, what they do, like a 4 door 2wd sedan vs a 1-ton dually or a CJ-5.  

And they all have different codes of conduct.  TT is probably one of the strictest on nudity, hate speech, etc.  

[WhatTheBuck 28713]

2 hours ago, pyrohornIII said:

All those work differently and have different purposes and regulations.  It's not as simple as one brand vs the other like Chevy vs Lexus.  It's more about how they work, what they do, like a 4 door 2wd sedan vs a 1-ton dually or a CJ-5.  

And they all have different codes of conduct.  TT is probably one of the strictest on nudity, hate speech, etc.  

“There's some shitty content, but also a lot of good stuff.  And it's not just kids either.    There are some pretty sharp folks on there.”

None of that is unique to TikTok. TikTok is the current fad. It will eventually be replaced by the “next big thing” to come down the virtual pike.

[pyrohornIII 4809]

Ok

 

[Nice Guy Eddie 13414]

I find that TikTok shows me content that I’m interested in seeing and I rarely run across any hateful speech. On the other hand, you’re not going to catch me with any Facebook app staying on my phone.

[HamsterHookah 112]

The Chinese tech giant posted record underlying profit last year (known as EBIDTA) and is now more profitable than fellow Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Tencent, per the Financial Times. ByteDance grew sales 30% in 2022 to $85 billion, and its profits surged 79% to $25 billion. Worth $300 billion last year, ByteDance is the world’s most valuable private company.