Only figuratively in the hacker/gamer sense. TikTok is owned by ByteSense.
The "TikTok can be used to spy on americans" is much like "Russians interfered in our elections". Both are true, both are legitimately very concerning, but both are also things that the USA has been doing for decades with minimal domestic outcry.
So implicit in our attempts to reign in other countries behavior is that other countries should be attempting to reign in ours. If these are behaviors we think the world would be better off without, the best place to reign in that behavior is by starting with our own government.
As has been stated voluminously elsewhere in this comment section, and better by others than my attempt here: we have a (quasi-?)democratic apparatus and constitutional framework that governs our country's use of this power.
Does China or Russia allow for those kinds of tools for holding government accountable? Not as far as I can tell.
>Only figuratively in the hacker/gamer sense. TikTok is owned by ByteSense.
No, in the very literal sense that Bytedance has a board of directors, and on that board is a CCP member who has the real final say on everything the company does. When you are a business in China, you defacto work for the government.
China isn't America with a red flag, it's a fundamentally different system. Too many people think they know China because they understand America.
If Biden wants instagram showing people pictures of ponies, it simply isn't going to happen. If Xi wants tiktok to show people ponies, the next day every kid in america will be looking at ponies.
> No, in the very literal sense that Bytedance has a board of directors, and on that board is a CCP member who has the real final say on everything the company does. When you are a business in China, you defacto work for the government.
Would you say the same thing if they employed CIA and NSA people in executive positions, and had ex-generals and ex-spooks on the board?
No. A CIA agent might have ulterior motives being on a board, but they are just another board member (I also doubt many board members are secretly CIA).
Every company in China however answers directly to the part, and every board has a party member on it, who holds 100% of the voting power.
No, it is literally true that every company has a party member they must answer too. Whether its a board member or a local party representative.
There is no business autonomy with a court to settle differences. The party wants it, the party gets it. Full Stop.
>The board of directors of a company are not generally owners.
Like I said, China is not America. On Chinese Boards sits a party member who has absolute control. China doesn't care what function American boards typically serve.
> No, it is literally true that every company has a party member they must answer too. Whether its a board member or a local party representative.
Which still doesn't make it literally true that: "The Chinese government owns tiktok", (unless, in addition to using "own" figuratively you are also using "literal" in the now common sense that actually means "figurative").
We're not talking about America. Chinese companies are defacto arms of the chinese government. It's a communist country. Any sense of private ownership is just a sense, it doesn't really exist.
I don't know how many times we have to go in this circle until we get through that dense skull. If you think you understand Chinese business because you understand western business - you don't.
Only figuratively in the hacker/gamer sense. TikTok is owned by ByteSense.
The "TikTok can be used to spy on americans" is much like "Russians interfered in our elections". Both are true, both are legitimately very concerning, but both are also things that the USA has been doing for decades with minimal domestic outcry.
So implicit in our attempts to reign in other countries behavior is that other countries should be attempting to reign in ours. If these are behaviors we think the world would be better off without, the best place to reign in that behavior is by starting with our own government.