• atrielienz@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    I have a question. How would it be moderated and by whom? In an age where the warthunder forums literally have a leak of classified info like monthly, and the US is increasingly losing the cyber security war because people can’t do simple things like not plug random usb’s they found on the side of the road into their work computers, I don’t really understand why it’s hard to believe tik tok is a threat to national security.

    The permissions it asks for on your phone are kind of a red flag. Specifically access to the camera and microphone. Mostly because with it being controlled by the CCP (as most successful Chinese Businesses are), it is absolutely trivial for them to gather information “anonymously” about their users, de-anonymize it, and then target those users with anything and everything including pro CCP propaganda. That alone is reason enough for me to understand why federal employees aren’t allowed to use tik tok on any federal device (work phones and computers for instance).

    I don’t necessarily think forcing them to sell to another entity will fix the problems with tik tok. I think this bill is intended to be a “solution” to placate people. Mostly because it doesn’t seem like it’s been written by people who understand the technology. But I also wouldn’t say that tik tok is harmless or blameless.

    Why does tik tok need to gather information about what banking apps I use? What healthcare apps I use? Why does it need my GPS location? Why can it collect this data without my consent? Why and how does it collect information on people even if they don’t use tik tok? Have never used tik tok?

    On top of that Tik Tok got caught spying on reporters with the intent to track down their sources. That’s terrifying.

    https://www.welivesecurity.com/2023/03/24/what-tiktok-knows-you-should-know-tiktok/