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Originally Posted by JPhillips
I think you're underplaying the China connection. I don't know how accurate the accusation is, but plenty of people in both parties honestly believe China is using Tik Tok as an intelligence operation.
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There's not a shred of evidence that's taking place. In fact, the reasons for the ban seem to change each week. I'd also add that they don't need TikTok to spy, Meta and others freely sell data to anyone who wants it, including foreign governments. TikTok actually follows data privacy laws more stringently than others because they have a target on their back.
Countries like Saudi Arabia have huge ownership stakes in Meta and Twitter. In fact, the Saudis had a spy embedded at Twitter that would funnel information on dissidents that lead to executions. No outcry right now to ban either one of those or restrict ownership.
And I have no doubt that people in both parties want it banned. There is a fuckton of money being thrown around to make this happen. Not just from their direct competitors, but from investors of those companies and foreign countries who see it as hurting their message. There's a reason AIPAC has targeted TikTok so much.
But I guess that's the funny part of all this. We're pretending to be concerned about a foreign country influencing our public at the behest of a foreign country that wants to influence our public. Only in America!