The Senate has passed legislation that would force TikTok’s China-based parent company to sell the social media platform under the threat of a ban, a contentious move by U.S. lawmakers that’s expected to face legal challenges and disrupt the lives of content creators who rely on the short-form video
I know that I heard (on the 538 podcast) that before voting on this, congress was given a security briefing about it, and after that there was wide bipartisan support for the ban (and we all know how rare bipartisan support is these days). It sounds like the security briefing was pretty compelling. If it’s not just theoretical that Chinese gocernment could leverage tiktok to spy on Americans and influence them, and there’s evidence that they are already doing it, I think it makes the case for the ban much stronger. But the information has not been made public.
I’ll also note that they set the ban to not go into effect until after the election.
This seems to be the case, but congress is doing an awful job of communicating the danger to the public. There will likely be a lot of people angry at Biden when he signs this if there is no effort to justify the targeted action.
I feel like it isn’t congress’s job to do that. They don’t have to share or repeat information that they are not experts on to the public. They can share their thought process and rationale for supporting legislation, but we shouldn’t expect them to be perceived as technical experts. I bet that fewer than 10 congressional representatives can look at a portion of code and make an educated statement on what’s going on and how authors may be performing abnormal operations or obfuscating other actions.
It’s the job of the organization(s) that prepare the security briefing, and we’ve already been hearing this kind of thing in the cybersecurity field for years. Those in the know, know. Those not, tend to not believe it. Warnings about the potential for data harvesting and information operations via platforms like (and specifically) Tik Tok aren’t new.
This is like public health information during COVID. Medical professionals have the training and experience to share their professional assessments, but large portions of the population were instead solely relying on politicians to deliver medical information.
Young people get a lot of their news and information from TikTok. The US government doesn’t have their hands in TikTok like they do domestic social media platforms.
Uhh, yeah, we’re a representative democracy. This passed through both houses of congress and is on its way to be signed by the president. You know, the completely normal legislative process.
I know that I heard (on the 538 podcast) that before voting on this, congress was given a security briefing about it, and after that there was wide bipartisan support for the ban (and we all know how rare bipartisan support is these days). It sounds like the security briefing was pretty compelling. If it’s not just theoretical that Chinese gocernment could leverage tiktok to spy on Americans and influence them, and there’s evidence that they are already doing it, I think it makes the case for the ban much stronger. But the information has not been made public.
I’ll also note that they set the ban to not go into effect until after the election.
This seems to be the case, but congress is doing an awful job of communicating the danger to the public. There will likely be a lot of people angry at Biden when he signs this if there is no effort to justify the targeted action.
I feel like it isn’t congress’s job to do that. They don’t have to share or repeat information that they are not experts on to the public. They can share their thought process and rationale for supporting legislation, but we shouldn’t expect them to be perceived as technical experts. I bet that fewer than 10 congressional representatives can look at a portion of code and make an educated statement on what’s going on and how authors may be performing abnormal operations or obfuscating other actions.
It’s the job of the organization(s) that prepare the security briefing, and we’ve already been hearing this kind of thing in the cybersecurity field for years. Those in the know, know. Those not, tend to not believe it. Warnings about the potential for data harvesting and information operations via platforms like (and specifically) Tik Tok aren’t new.
This is like public health information during COVID. Medical professionals have the training and experience to share their professional assessments, but large portions of the population were instead solely relying on politicians to deliver medical information.
So ban data harvesting? That seems pretty common sense. Instead we’re giving our government autocratic powers pick winners in the market.
Young people get a lot of their news and information from TikTok. The US government doesn’t have their hands in TikTok like they do domestic social media platforms.
That’s it. That’s the ban.
If there is evidence then let’s hear it in court. We are not an Autocracy.
Uhh, yeah, we’re a representative democracy. This passed through both houses of congress and is on its way to be signed by the president. You know, the completely normal legislative process.
You can vote yourself out of a democracy at any time.