From the posts, they can extrapolate the current levels of the US Botox, Silicon & Saline Strategic Reserves.I've been trying to figure out just what sort of "data" anyone could glean from TikTok that would be of any national or personal concern.
You sure about that?the US-based social media companies can be they are still not state-controlled entities. That's the big difference with TikTok.
Same here on Facebook. It's all crap now but everyone knew they would fall off once they started to move it towards a revenue producing venture. Same with Amazon. They ran at a loss to give free 2 day shipping for years in order to gain traction but once that pile of early investor money dries up, they have to become like every other business and their model is not profitable.I have no desire at all to create a TikTok account. Even though younger people appear to enjoy it the app seems like a big waste of time to me.
In the early days of Facebook that app seemed really great. I was able to get back in touch with a lot of friends I had during my childhood and teenage years moving from one Marine Corps duty station to the next. It worked a whole lot better at find old friends that other early social media apps like Friendster. In more recent years the various "American" social media apps became more annoying for all the anger pornography (often political) being allowed to get the most attention in "news" feeds. As good or bad as the US-based social media companies can be they are still not state-controlled entities. That's the big difference with TikTok. As hard as the executives of TikTok try to imply they are their own bosses they only make it more clear they're getting their marching orders from the Chinese government.
Too true. I was an original prime member, it was awesome. I don't really see/feel that prime member beni anymore. Other than the rising annual fee.Same here on Facebook. It's all crap now but everyone knew they would fall off once they started to move it towards a revenue producing venture. Same with Amazon. They ran at a loss to give free 2 day shipping for years in order to gain traction but once that pile of early investor money dries up, they have to become like every other business and their model is not profitable.
victor bogdanov said:You sure about that?
So ... If you have a sensitive position within us security, don't have TikTok on your work phone, common knowledge for years. As for the general use of TikTok... The intelligence they are gathering is that there are some ignorant and illiterate people of no real interest. And we need big brother to monitor this why?Yeah. Facebook, Twitter, Instragram, Linkedin or whatever are not state-owned, state-controlled entities. That's very clear. The US government has to jump through a lot of legal hoops to subpoena data from those companies, which usually attracts a hell of a lot of publicity. And the gub'ment is often not successful in such attempts. Usually there is so much potential for PR push-back the US government doesn't even try.
The Communist Chinese government has its tentacles burrowed pretty deep into TikTok. If the Red China bosses want to monitor TikTok account activity of someone, such as an American journalist covering Taiwan affairs, they can do so without any difficulty at all or without anyone knowing about it at all.
It's bad enough that any social media app (or most phone apps in general) can gain access to many internal features of a smart phone. A private or publicly traded social media company at worst is only going to be motivated to gather user data for sales and marketing purposes. A police-state government with sinister intentions can go a whole lot farther if it can force a social media company to obey commands. That's what the Chinese government can do with TikTok. If you have the TikTok app loaded on your phone it's possible the Chinese government could access data to track your movements or even listen in on anything you say near your phone if they decide you're a threat to them. With the way voice recognition technology works they could have super computers crunching audio data from many millions of users looking for any key phrases to automatically ding a person into a hot list of people to watch.
There has been a good amount of outcry and even some organized protests against the real possibility TikTok could be banned in the US. Some people have businesses built within TikTok. On one level I can sympathize with their situation. On the other hand there has been zero secret at all about where TikTok was based and its attachments to the police-state Chinese government. The risks of using the app have been out there in the open for years. If the app ends up being wiped off American phones and Internet access it shouldn't surprise anyone.
I've heard good things about the privacy of signal.My youngest son is doing a European rotation as part of the Army in the undisclosed Putin Containment Zone.
Before they left they had everyone switch over from Whatsapp to Signal on their phones.
Being able to message, video, and live-call him over there makes it less stressful on our end and on him too, I think.
I'm sure the other side is taking advantage of this but it's not like they don't already know exactly who is there, where they are, and what they are doing.
The digital, connected world is something else.
I've been trying to figure out just what sort of "data" anyone could glean from TikTok that would be of any national or personal concern.
These guys are too sarcastic to get any point. Why did you use that as an answer? Seriously Paul, what do you think, IN YOUR OWN WORDS?
Boudica said:So ... If you have a sensitive position within us security, don't have TikTok on your work phone, common knowledge for years. As for the general use of TikTok... The intelligence they are gathering is that there are some ignorant and illiterate people of no real interest. And we need big brother to monitor this why?