
How TikTok and ByteDance could be using – and abusing – user data - onetimemanytime
https://www.businessinsider.com/how-tiktok-and-bytedance-could-be-using-abusing-user-data-2020-8
======
DarthGhandi
> Samantha Hoffman and Fergus Ryan, both experts on China at the Australian
> Strategic Policy Institute

As a patriotic Australian I'd like to give you all a friendly reminder about
ASPI. While presenting themselves as an independent think tank for the Asia
Pacific region they are anything but.

This organisation that pumps out news articles more than papers are entirely
funded by companies and departments that need ever more war and security
theatre to feed their budgets. Some of their biggest donors include Raytheon,
BAE, Northrup Gunnman and the US department of state, not to mention the
Australian department of defense. Ironically we only found out about the
foreign funding due to electoral interference laws originally aimed at the
Chinese, no one knew about this US funding until they were forced to disclose
it.

How "independent" does that sound as a source for expert advice on a scale of
one to ten?

For an organisation that supposedly has Australia's best interest at heart
they somehow manage to constantly get everything wrong from Saddamm's
imaginary weapons of mass destruction to our decades long involvement in Iraq
and Afghanistan, the rise of ISIS, the terrible materiel purchases that were
billions more than they should be and protecting a man who proudly commits and
boasts about extrajudicial murder in the Philippines.

Australian politicians across a wide political spectrum have voiced deep
concerns about their influence and funding sources.

Does this sound like a group of people that really care about advancing
Australia, or something else is at work?

I'm all for protecting data from overzealous evil companies, but you'll be
waiting a very long time for these _independent_ national security specialists
to say a single thing about the forty other apps on Australian phones sending
sensitive data across the globe every minute.

[https://www.michaelwest.com.au/independent-think-tank-
aspi-b...](https://www.michaelwest.com.au/independent-think-tank-aspi-behind-
push-for-more-defence-spending-rakes-in-advisory-fees/)

[https://johnmenadue.com/john-menadue-australian-strategic-
po...](https://johnmenadue.com/john-menadue-australian-strategic-policy-
institute-by-their-fruits-you-will-know-them/)

------
spcebar
I'm all for protecting user data, but this article does an extremely poor job
demonstrating why the app is a security risk besides saying that it's a
Chinese company, which we know.

~~~
Nightshaxx
As the article says, it's not about what they are collecting. It's about what
they would do with that information and who they would ban.

Yes the US government does collect information, but at least to some extent
they can be held accountable by it's citizens. No one can hold the CCP
accountable and they can use these companies as a proxy to enforce Chinese
censorship in other countries. (See Zoom banning US accounts made by Chinese
protestors)

So I think you see the ban as a technological security risk, which, relative
to most other big tech, it's not. It's a national security risk to the US and
India.

~~~
curiousgal
I find it strange that people still defend the U.S. in a post-Snowden world.

> held accountable

How exactly? For all we know the CIA is still doing it's thing. As for U.S.
companies spying on people, I am sure fines have taught them not to. /s

Censorship is bad but it's TikTok, it's not like the censored parties would
lose sleep over it. Same with Zoom, the plethora of alternatives make it a
non-issue in my opinion.

------
chenzhekl
As a Chinese, I'm really tired of seeing such news being pushed to the
frontpage of HN. Sure, the data big companies are collecting nowadays are
concerning. But it's not specific to Chinese companies. Well, people may say
they don't trust the Chinese government. How is the US government better? Has
Snowden been forgotten already?

Endlessly selective criticism towards China make us think if people from other
countries are just inclined to think that the CCP is evil, and so is China. As
a result, everything that is connected to China is (especially) bad.

~~~
cochne
As an American I somewhat agree with your sentiment in that Google is probably
just as bad as ByteDance. However, I think we see about the same amount of
flak against Google on this website so I don’t agree with your point about it
being specific to China.

Also, I believe the CCP is certainly evil based on reports of numerous human
rights violations. The USA is also on the whole evil, but I would say to a
much lesser degree.

------
bobbydreamer
Sommeone needs to build a app which is sort of VM Player in a mobile device,
where you can install the app inside and we choose the location or country
where this VM can be hosted. Just so you know nobody tracks location.

I couldn't be the only one with this idea.

------
martinaoe2
Don't think China can complain too much when the west bans Chinese companies
for any reason. They have been doing it for years in China.

I wish we could target the platforms that give apps access to this info. Can
we please develop a non-google (ad company) platform?

