Mastodawn

Voron Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz our #politicians #congress critters etc should wear patches of the companies they own the most stock in like race car drivers so we know who they are driving for
#tiktok

@taylorlorenz Look who opposes this bill. Trump, Musk, Marjorie Taylor Greene. And AOC, (who suffers from millennial self-interest)

All the wrong people are aligned to protect TikTok

@allanb Psst. It’s Zoomers and below who use TikTok mostly. We Millennials aren’t the kids who you want to get off your lawn anymore, we’re too old, the youngest of us are in our mid-30s.

ocdtrekkie Mar 22, 2024

@MisuseCase @allanb Cursed to be both be old and referred to as "those young kids" forever.

@MisuseCase

75% of TikTok users are 18-34
AOC is 34, and is a Millennial.

Maybe I am not understanding your point

https://www.oberlo.com/statistics/tiktok-age-demographics

@MisuseCase

TikTok Age Demographics [Updated Mar 2024] | Oberlo

New data on TikTok age demographics shows that more than two in three adult TikTokers are from the ages of 18 to 34. Here’s a breakdown of TikTok users by age.

HistoPol (#HP) 🏴 🇺🇸 🏴Mar 23, 2024

@allanb

Thanks. @MisuseCase

So only 30.7% of #TikTok users are older than 34, I.E.
Older #Millenials (Born before 1990)
#GenX,
#BabyBoomers, #SilentGeneration, and maybe a few exceptions from the #GIgeneration.

https://mastodon.social/@allanb/112141398872773820

@allanb My point is that you are using a generational term in the sense of “those damn kids who won’t get off my lawn” for a Congresswoman in her mid-30s and also incidentally for me, a woman in her middle age who is a parent with a mortgage.

It’s absurd and kind of inappropriate.

@MisuseCase The point I was making was an attempt to describe AOC's self interest in TikTok as being Millennial interest, and a conflict of interest (or representation, depending on how you want to look at it.)

I said nothing about lawns or getting off them

@allanb That’s a pretty silly thing to say given the OP’s post about very real financial stakes in the TikTok bill, which AOC doesn’t have (unlike some other Representatives).

Also *I* don’t use TikTok contrary to your Millennial stereotype, thanks very much. I know some people who do. They use it to promote their businesses or work (fitness training, live performance, crafts, etc.).

@MisuseCase

AOC may not have monetary interest in TikTok, but she has generational interest (her national constituents are largely Millennials and younger). TikTok is mostly an artifact of Millennials and younger.

The fact remains it is a spying platform, and has been used to put surveillance on journalists and others.

National security interests are being weighed against generational-centered social platforms, and one would expect her to object.

Despite Trump/MTG being in the same corner

https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2022/03/30/facebook-targeted-victory-attack-rival-tiktok/7224564001/

@allanb Well, here’s the thing. I am one of those silly vapid Millennials but I’m also a 15-year cybersecurity professional who’s reasonably familiar with issues like tracking and surveillance in America and the threats posed by various state actors.

TikTok isn’t really a spying platform any more than any other commercial social media network, but Meta, for whom it is a serious competitor, would like the public and the government to think otherwise.

Facebook hired Republican consulting firm Targeted Victory to turn public against rival TikTok

Facebook parent company Meta orchestrated nationwide campaign to sway public opinion against popular competitor TikTok, the Washington Post reported.

USA TODAY

https://theintercept.com/2024/03/16/tiktok-china-security-threat/

@allanb Even our intelligence agencies, after marching along with Meta beating the Yellow Peril drum for a while, have admitted that TikTok isn’t used for spying.

It doesn’t sell data on its users to American data brokers that they can buy from, which they don’t like, which is part of why they wanted to ban it (or now, they want to get it sold to an American owner).

TikTok Threat Is Purely Hypothetical, U.S. Intelligence Admits

“We have nothing to add,” the FBI said, when asked for evidence of TikTok’s actual threat.

The Intercept

https://www.npr.org/2024/03/14/1238520324/steve-mnuchin-buy-tiktok-ban-house-bill

@allanb And now Steve Mnuchin is trying to get investors together to buy TikTok. Peter Thiel of Palantir seems pretty interested too. They’d like to do to it what Elon Musk did to Twitter, or do what they accuse the CCP of doing with it (which they are not actually doing).

And now there’s this whole thing about members of Congress having a financial interest in TikTok being sold to American owners and benefiting companies they hold a stake in.

@allanb So “TikTok is used for spying” seems like a pretty flimsy excuse for anticompetitive behavior by Meta, or various shady people getting their hands on young people’s data and making money off it, or both. Or doing what they claim China is doing!

Anyway this is all a bunch of jingoistic nonsense and we should get some real privacy legislation instead but we won’t, and this won’t get us any closer to it.

@allanb Also I don’t know about you but. I’m not on board with the idea of banning something just because the kids are into it and I don’t necessarily get the appeal.

/end

Stationkeeper Mar 23, 2024

@MisuseCase @allanb Preach it!

Tom O'Brien Mar 23, 2024

@MisuseCase
This is a valuable summary of what’s going on. Bogus defenses against bogus dangers.

Nazani Mar 23, 2024

@MisuseCase @allanb
The problem is, under Chinese law, TikTok is obligated to cooperate with Chinese intelligence services in whatever way they dictate. That can go far beyond data mining.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM

@Nazani @allanb The U.S. has a version of that too (with a few extra steps):

Also American law enforcement agencies get our data from American social media companies, cell phone companies, etc. to surveil and harm us, American citizens. They use this to harm women seeking reproductive healthcare in states where it’s illegal, for example.

1/2

PRISM - Wikipedia

@Nazani @allanb Accusations of what the CCP is doing by mining TikTok user data seem pretty unserious (IMO) in comparison to what I *know* intelligence and law enforcement agencies in my own country where I live do with my data and my fellow citizens’ data. The only problem that my government has with TikTok is that they’re not in on the action.

2/2

Nazani Mar 23, 2024

@MisuseCase @allanb
It's about espionage
Finding & targeting dissidents
Preparation for the invasion of Taiwan
Malware attacks against any nation that obstructs China's ambitions
The risks go far beyond any use that could be made of your personal data.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Personnel_Management_data_breach

@Nazani @allanb China can do all that (it does all that) with or without TikTok.

As for getting hold of Americans’ personal data? Take it up with OPM, whose poorly secured database of clearance applicants allowed China to get their data in 2015.

(If there are any Americans who actually need to worry about China getting their data, it’s those with security clearances.)

1/2

Office of Personnel Management data breach - Wikipedia

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/experian-hacked-tmobile_n_560e0d30e4b0af3706e0481e

@Nazani @allanb Or talk to Experian, one of the three major credit reporting bureaus which holds sensitive personal and financial data on millions of Americans. They keep suffering from data breaches and at least one of those was likely a Chinese state-sponsored hack.

I will believe the U.S. government cares about China getting my data when it makes Experian clean up its act.

2/2

Massive Data Breach At Experian Exposes Personal Data For 15 Million T-Mobile Customers

Connecticut's attorney general said he will launch an investigation into the breach.

HuffPost

Dumpster Bitch 🚮Mar 23, 2024

@MisuseCase @allanb Some of us are as young as 28, still too old to be on people's lawns though

Dirk Jäckel Mar 22, 2024

@allanb @taylorlorenz I bet AOC advocates for a real solution that protects users against abuse from all social media companies.

mark Mar 22, 2024

@allanb @taylorlorenz mtg does because Trump told her too. Trump switched sides because a rich guy told him to. Musk is irrelevant with his nazi platform, and should be afraid if govt starts overseeing platforms this way

Popolon 🇵🇸🇳🇨☮️🌳🎋 ᠫᠣᠫᠣᠯᠣᠨ🐎抱抱龙🐉 ⏚φ Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz Using decentralized services and boycott their own would be a good response so.

Lesley Carhart

Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz it’s such a joke, lol

Ramón 🇨🇴Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz it’s interesting to see this come afloat. Following point made by @reckless1280 maybe it’ll get them to release the evidence that made them almost unanimously vote for the ban.

ǝʌɐp Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz always the smoke screen, incredible

Michael Gemar Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz Politicians should not be allowed to own individual stocks. They should be “invested” in the economy as a whole, and not specific companies.

Terminhell Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz wHaT a SuRprIse

Democracy Dies in Dumbass Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz I'm not on the "TikTok = China" bandwagon (it was full).

But I'm definitely on the "TikTok promotes stupidity" bandwagon...I've never seen one site so directly contribute to the dumbing down of America...and that's including Twitter...

@ShredderFeeder Have you ever heard of Facebook

@MisuseCase and yet still not as bad as tiktok

https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/09/myanmar-facebooks-systems-promoted-violence-against-rohingya-meta-owes-reparations-new-report/

@ShredderFeeder Facebook is demonstrably worse because it’s been used to incite and/or promote genocides (in Myanamar and Ethiopia) as well as other acts of ethnic cleansing elsewhere.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/oct/07/facebooks-role-in-myanmar-and-ethiopia-under-new-scrutiny

Whatever other problems TikTok may have, it does not have that dubious distinction.

Myanmar: Facebook’s systems promoted violence against Rohingya; Meta owes reparations – new report

Amnesty International

@MisuseCase oh I get that. I was speaking of pure stupidity. I've never seen a single tide-pod on Facebook. It's a haven for morons.

@ShredderFeeder Facebook has its own stupid things like conspiracy theories and the equivalent of chain letters. If you have never seen those kinds of things on Facebook it’s because you weren’t in contact with people who shared them or didn’t go looking for them.

The “Tide Pod Challenge” wasn’t actually popular on TikTok until some journalist found it and wrote about it and then everyone looked it up because the journalist wrote about it.

@MisuseCase it's all stupid shit. Useless twats who think they're going to be famous by showing their tits and idiots showing off their stupid dance moves. Tiktok is blocked on my home and work networks. Then again so is Facebook, Instagram, etc.

@ShredderFeeder I don’t know about you but I’m not into “the kids are into it and I don’t understand the appeal, let’s block it.”

@MisuseCase oh I understand it...(It's not hard). It's stupid and doesn't do ANYTHING to improve society.

@ShredderFeeder Bet a lot of people think that about one or two of your special interests

@MisuseCase maybe. But not enough to legislate against them..

@ShredderFeeder Lucky you. Your thing isn’t in competition with a deep-pocketed American megacorporation and it’s not tainted by association with foreigners or young women.

@MisuseCase maybe you need to find a better thing.

@ShredderFeeder I’m not on TikTok. I just don’t reflexively jump on the bandwagon of wanting to abolish whatever the youths are into these days because I personally am not into it.

Pierric Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz it's nice to see such a representative organ of democracy.

Kals_Els Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz that should be worth an investigation, a veto and divestment of all their stocks before they can try this crap again.

Blue Eyed Hexe 🇺🇲🦆Mar 22, 2024

@taylorlorenz exhibit A why members of Congress should never be allowed to own stock.