
TikTok and WeChat: Curating and controlling global information flows - hardmaru
https://www.aspi.org.au/report/tiktok-wechat
======
angio
I think people reading the article should familiarize themselves with ASPI
[0]. Their funding comes from: Embassy of Japan, Taipei Economic and Cultural
Office in Australia, Lockheed Martin, BAE Systems, Northrop Grumman, Thales
Group, and Raytheon Technologies. I would take everything they write with a
grain of salt since they have a huge conflict of interest in pushing a new
cold-war rhetoric.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Strategic_Policy_In...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Strategic_Policy_Institute)

~~~
abc-xyz
Their sponsors also include Google, Microsoft, Oracle, etc. who would likely
prefer not to escalate the ‘new cold war’ since it would hurt their profits.

~~~
dis-sys
No, as clearly listed on ASPI's official website, Google, Microsoft, Oracle
are sponsors of ASPI's International Cyber Policy Centre (ICPC), they are not
sponsors of ASPI itself.

ASPI sponsors and ICPC sponsors are listed separately on ASPI's official
website for a reason.

[https://www.aspi.org.au/sponsors](https://www.aspi.org.au/sponsors)

~~~
abc-xyz
Their annual report does not make this distinction: [https://s3-ap-
southeast-2.amazonaws.com/ad-aspi/2019-10/ASPI...](https://s3-ap-
southeast-2.amazonaws.com/ad-
aspi/2019-10/ASPI%20AR_18_19_acc.pdf?KUIH5L_aiOUu4hm96FaCXmN2cqEv5Do8=)

But it’s really besides the point. Instead of attacking the authors or their
sponsors, perhaps we should focus on the content instead. What’s happening
here would be equivalent to me attacking you or the parent (and vice versa)
for having a comment history pushing CCP talking points.

------
Aperocky
It seems the US (and Australia) is hell bent on banning Wechat, if they think
this is going to win any minds of wechat user, they're just dead wrong. People
use wechat to communicate with their family and friends, just like how people
in the west use facebook, except more.

Imagine if you are a Chinese person overseas, all of your family and friends
are on wechat, then one day BAM it's all banned. Would you be thankful for US
government for 'saving your personal information from CCP'?

The day that Apple removes Wechat from appstore is the day they sell their
last iPhone in China. You can't live in China without it, simple as that. It
essentially replaces phone numbers.

~~~
llboston
Why has Wechat became pretty much the only way the oversea Chinese communicate
with their family and friends in China? One of the reasons is, CCP has banned
the rest.

Probably you might be aware of this
[https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/we-people-
support-...](https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/we-people-support-ban-
wechat-and-tiktok) Over 100k Chinese American petitioned to ban Wechat and
TikTok in the US.

~~~
sudosysgen
How do you know that the anonymous online petition signers are all Chinese
Americans?

And for WeChat becoming so ubiquitous, it's a case of network effect. China
isn't the outlier, the West is. Try living in South America without Whatsapp.

~~~
mschuster91
Whatsapp however does not engage in censorship, something both Tiktok and
Wechat have been proven to do.

~~~
chrischen
Actually facebook (Owners of whatsapp) does engage in censorship.

They censor nipples, kamallaharris.info website, and certain right wing
groups.

I think the fact that you are this one-sided in the “censorship” department
shows how propagandized you’ve become. Propaganda is everywhere, done by all
factions. It’s not just something the communist party does. Every party does
it.

~~~
mschuster91
I never claimed Facebook didn't engage in censorship. I was talking about
_Whatsapp_.

~~~
sudosysgen
Whatsapp is wholy owned by Facebook.

------
yorwba
> This report recommends (on page 50) that governments implement transparent
> user data privacy and user data protection frameworks that apply to all
> social media networks.

Sounds like a good initiative. Unfortunately, I expect most social media
networks to resist that kind of regulation. Except maybe for TikTok and
WeChat, since regulation would be better for them than the total ban they're
facing.

------
wombatmobile
Who is the ASPI?

The Australian Financial Review says:

The think tank behind Australia's changing view of China

The Department of Defence-backed Australian Strategic Policy Institute has
become a flashpoint in the breakdown of consensus in Beijing.

[https://www.afr.com/policy/foreign-affairs/the-think-tank-
be...](https://www.afr.com/policy/foreign-affairs/the-think-tank-behind-
australia-s-changing-view-of-china-20200131-p53wgp)

~~~
free_rms
"Defense-oriented Think Tank Hypes Up Chinese and/or Russian Threat"

------
mola
Somehow these social media giants from the west would be allowed to collect
crazy amount of data on their users, but tiktok would be deemed illegal.

If there was a real concern for users privacy and safety this would've been
taken care of awhile ago.

All this is just war drums that try to seem like privacy concerns.

US corporate greed gave China a platform for world domination by offshoring
everything. Now that the tiger is loose, us plebs need to go to war for them.

Bah.

~~~
stelonix
Just wish there was a place like HN but with people who see the bullshit in
imperialism. This is the place I come for rational discussion but when it
comes to geopolitical issues, the globalist/western propaganda is rampant.
Being from a country that has always been under US interventionism makes it
unnerving. Lots of the people here, even if more (copy)left leaning, when it
comes to geopolitics they just believe the western anti-communist koolaid;
which is the reason I refrain from commenting anything that goes against the
"commom sense" western propaganda.

~~~
readarticle
_Somehow these social media giants from X would be allowed to collect crazy
amount of data on their users, but Y’s would be deemed illegal._

Could unironically be answered “Yes, and?” in a rational discussion about
geopolitical issues, especially one without a globalist (or specifically
western) bent.

I’ve gone ahead and done that in response to the GP just now.

~~~
mola
Rational geopolitics usually lead to war. Because rationality, the kind you
talk about, is a farce, a rationalizing, that hides the true motives. When
these are not acknowledge you can't critic the actions on the correct terms.
Thus these "rationality" usually spirals out of control.

Friendship, joint ideals empathy, are not strictly rational.

~~~
readarticle
Friendship, joint ideals, and empathy don’t exist at the international level
without a third party security guarantor keeping the various sides down, see:
the history of Europe pre 1945 (and post ~2030 or so).

You’re not coming to HN to look for a rational discussion of geopolitics,
you’re looking for someone to agree with.

------
swiley
People are pushed into these awful chat apps by the anticompetetive behavior
of smart phone OS vendors. The next time you argue for the merits of walled
garden app stores think about the damage cooperate controlled chat app servers
and curated feeds have done to the internet and the public.

------
claudeganon
> Governments should require that all social media platforms investigate and
> disclose information operations being conducted on their platforms by state
> and non-state actors. Disclosures should include publicly releasing datasets
> linked to those information campaigns.

I thought the point of social media networks was so that governments can
conduct surveillance and information campaigns.

~~~
082349872349872
I thought the point of social media networks was so that _anyone_ who pays
enough[1] can conduct surveillance and information campaigns[2].

[1] It is claimed that "enough" could be under the corporate coffee budget.

[2] They might pronounce conducting these activities as "using custom and
lookalike digital insights to create meaningful audiences and reach your
business goals" however.

------
knolax
When I saw "curating and controlling global information flows" I honestly
couldn't tell if they meant that as a bad thing that TikTok was doing or a
good thing that Western governments should be doing. I made fun of the concept
of doublespeak when I first read 1984 but I think I get it now.

------
throwaway4good
From the website:

"This report recommends (on page 50) that governments implement transparent
user data privacy and user data protection frameworks that apply to all social
media networks. If companies refuse to comply with such frameworks, they
shouldn’t be allowed to operate. Independent audits of social media algorithms
should be conducted. Social media companies should be transparent about the
guidelines that human moderators use and what impact their decisions have on
their algorithms. Governments should require that all social media platforms
investigate and disclose information operations being conducted on their
platforms by state and non-state actors. Disclosures should include publicly
releasing datasets linked to those information campaigns."

Yes. If we could get Google, Facebook etc. to do this. That would be great.
Thanks, signed someone in Europe.

~~~
free_rms
It's a security think tank for a five eyes country. The problem with WeChat is
that they don't get access.

~~~
49531
Yea I really don't know how people can take this information seriously; it is
just so on-the-nose.

------
ImAlreadyTracer
I have so many Chinese friends that want me to get Wechat. Should I get it? Im
worried about it's connections with the CCP though.

~~~
FooBarWidget
Chinese here.

I don't get your worries. Yes your conversation will be monitored. But you
_know_ that. And let's face it, 99.9% of your conversation won't be political
(I'm just making an educated guess here; I don't know you), nor about
sensitive subjects.

If you want to talk about sensitive subjects, you can always ask those friends
to get off Wechat and on a different channel, specifically for those subjects.

For the 99.9% of fun, personal conversations that are about cat photo sharing,
pizza recipes and the latest celebrities, Wechat is not a problem. CCP really
doesn't care about those, they just care that nobody on Wechat causes trouble
(by their definition of "trouble").

When do you accidentally say something considered not OK, the worst that
happens is that the message gets deleted. They don't go after people unless
you're instigating mass protests or something like that.

You won't get advertisements about CCP propaganda. Unless you subscribe to
those channels yourself.

~~~
fsflover
> If you want to talk about sensitive subjects, you can always ask those
> friends to get off Wechat and on a different channel, specifically for those
> subjects.

Isn't you device already potentially compromised when you install WeChat?

~~~
FooBarWidget
On iOS, every app is fully sandboxed from all others. You can't even run
background processes on iOS. Anything that modifies system behavior (such as
activating a VPN that snoops traffic) requires system confirmation dialogs. No
compromise can happen here.

On Android, isolation is not as strict and there are more holes. But each app
runs as a separate Linux user, and with each Android version Google locks down
the security model more.

Rootkits like you find on Windows just aren't possible on iOS and Android.

I believe they still allow clipboard snooping. I can't confirm nor deny
whether Wechat does this.

Apple and Google should do something about that and further restrict their
security model.

~~~
fsflover
> with each Android version Google locks down the security model more

Except most people will never get those updates.

------
BTCOG
Facebook is banned in China so there's no use in driveling over whether or not
Facebook should do this or that, or Google should do this or that (Google also
being banned in China)

This is simply the US copying China this time. I support banning all Chinese
apps. Let it begin.

------
throwaway4good
[https://www.aspi.org.au/sponsors](https://www.aspi.org.au/sponsors)

------
godelski
There's some important distinctions that come up with every single time we
talk about Chinese apps, so I want to lay them out (disclosure: American). And
can we just stop going through this literally every single time?

1) FAANG does this too:

    
    
      - I complain about that and so do many others here. Expect these people to also be upset about WeChat and TikTok. Anything else would be hypocritical. It is the same fight. We know. Stop the whataboutism. 
    
      - While FAANG often willingly shares data with the government and the many eyes, it is not unfettered. We've been making gains in the privacy regime and some of these companies are starting to say no (i.e. come back with a warrant). 
    
      - There is a difference, although slight (but meaningful), between a distribution of companies having my data vs a centralized body that controls all regulation.
    

2) They're just going after China:

    
    
      - There's a difference between your own government having your data and a foreign government. Especially when tensions are escalating between them.
    
      - See above where gov doesn't have unfettered access (not true in China).
    
      - We're complaining about FAANG too, it just isn't relevant in a conversation about TikTok and WeChat and derails the conversation with whataboutism. 
    

3) What about xyz app?

    
    
      - Same reason we complain about Facebook over other apps. Scale matters. Of course we're going after the app with a billion users before we go for an app with 100k users. 
    

4) Zuckerberg just wants to make a WeChat (super app) alternative:

    
    
      - See 1.1. I'll complain about that too. Wouldn't touch it with a ten foot poll. No way.
    

5) Something about government involvement ipso facto bias.

    
    
      - If you aren't looking for bias in every source that you read, what are you doing? Read, analyze, internalize. Every source has a bias. They define specific interests. Bias does not mean false. It is not a coup de ta. Yes, we should be aware, but people aren't bringing it up for the same reason we don't bring it up in literally every conversation: because we're aware and it often doesn't serve as a meaningful contribution to the discussion.
    
    

Can we actually discuss the article now?

