A Draft Of TikTok’s Plan To Avoid A Ban Gives The U.S. Government Unprecedented Oversight Power

So these two provisions caught my eye; under the draft agreement, executive branch agencies (the article gives the example of the DOJ or DOD) would have the ability to (among other things)

Examine TikTok’s U.S. facilities, records, equipment and servers with minimal or no notice,

In some circumstances, require ByteDance to temporarily stop TikTok from functioning in the United States.

In the case of the former, would that include user data? Given the general US gov approach to digital privacy I assume so, and granting yourself the power to do the things you’re afraid China is doing seems appropriately ironic for us.

As far as the latter, I wonder how broadly “some circumstances” is defined. If the language is broad enough, that would open the door to de facto censorship if a certain trend or info around a certain event is spreading on the site right as the government magically decides it needs to pause TikTok due to, “uh, terrorism or something, don’t worry about it.”

I’m also curious how durable this agreement would be. How hard would it be for the next administration to decide to pitch a fit and renegotiate or throw out the deal pending a new, even harsher agreement?

It would seem to me that this is pretty nakedly an assertion of power over an entity based outside the US, and not an agreement meant to protect US citizens in any meaningful way. I think any defense of this agreement as a way to protect privacy or mental health or whatever won’t be able to honestly reconcile with the fact that these exact same concerns exist with domestic social media companies

Can we literally just fix the fucking climate and stop spam callers.

It's gotten to the point where if I see a story in Forbes, I just automatically assume that the reality is the opposite.

unprecedented control over essential functions that it does not have over any other major free speech platform

The US government has claimed for itself the authority to eavesdrop on any and all internet communication inside the United States, alter the plotlines of TV and movies, and (if you accept that Trump can speak for the US government) pull the FCC licenses of news networks that report news the president doesn't like. Nothing in what's proposed on Tiktok comes close to any of that along any of those axes; it's factually wrong to say it's "unprecedented." I actually don't agree with any of those things, but putting what they now want to do in Tiktok beyond any of those categories of behavior is a gross exaggeration.

Ama Adams, a managing partner and CFIUS expert at Ropes & Gray, said that some of the government powers in the draft agreement were somewhat typical — including the right to inspect a company’s facilities and materials, and the use of a third-party monitor.

Yep.

But “setting up a structure that has allegiance to the United States — I’ve never seen language, per se, to that extent.”

Fair enough, but this only came about because Tiktok clearly has allegiance to a conflicting foreign power. Facebook and Google aren't required to have allegiance to the United States because they're allowed to do their own thing, because they seem like they're doing their own thing and that's fine under our system. This is like saying "No one else has to go on house arrest; it's unfair to single me out like this" after you robbed a liquor store.

These provisions seem designed to address fears — expressed by the Biden Administration, the Trump Administration, and legislators in both parties — that TikTok’s foreign ownership and control threaten U.S. national security.

Incorrect. This is designed to address "fears" that Tiktok functions explicitly as a surveillance tool for the Chinese government. It is required to do so by Chinese law, and contains features which are highly unusual which appear designed to spy on its users. That's above and beyond even the extremely invasive data-collection which most other social media apps also do (scanning your contacts, doing facial recognition on you, listening to your microphone, etc). I think it's fair to say that gathering that level of data on millions of individual people and then handing the information to the Chinese government on demand is a unique and dangerous capability which should be addressed in some fashion.

There actually are technologies (e.g. routers) where simply the "ownership and control" is an issue, and maybe those should be treated as a bigger deal than they are, but that's not this.

That would raise serious concerns about the government’s ability to censor or distort what people are saying or watching on TikTok.

Bro, you are lying. Again, they're actually fine with doing that in some other platforms, which I don't agree with either, but that very clearly isn't this. Forbes is only saying that this is the issue to try to distort the facts in order to oppose putting Tiktok under this kind of control. Why Forbes is lying in this specific manner I have no idea, but I'm genuinely very curious why they are.

Etc. etc.

It's like them saying "listen, we love authoritarian governance. Wanna have some of this TikTok bussy?" And then flaunts it's ass while winking and throwing kisses. Republicans be all sweaty, losening their ties, licking their lips...

If you don't post subversive messages, they won't be taken down. Get with the program.

This will destroy what we love about TikTok. The ability to get silenced news stories out that the established press either refuse to report on, or serve to hide or water down the narrative. The train derailment, the Alabama waterfront brawl, news on terrible legislative happenings, the ability to coordinate flashmob style protests.

They do this, we will NEED a replacement. I refuse to go back to navigating this political landscape blindly.