Yeah, well, most people look at TikTok and they say, well, what's the big deal?
It's just another viral video sharing app and that's just the sheep's clothing
as you walk through, it is a sophisticated tool for harvesting this data.
And one thing that we do know is that right now the CCP is running one of
the most widespread data gathering operations out there.
And TikTok has repeatedly said, don't worry, your data is stored in the US.
What we've come to find out from some of this investigative reporting and leaked
documents is in fact according to TikTok employees, everything is seen in China.
>> The man you just heard from is Brendan Carr,
he's one of the five FCC commissioners, Federal Communications Commissioners.
And he is very clear about what he wants Google and Apple to do,
he wants them to remove TikTok from their App Stores.
And if you're thinking, man, this is happening under Biden,
isn't this what Trump wanted to do?
Well, there's a reason why it sounds a lot like what the Trump administration
wanted to do.
Brendan Carr happens to be a Trump appointee
who unfortunately is still part of the FCC under the Biden administration.
So, this is really more about him as opposed to what Biden wants to do.
But here's what Carr said in a letter to Apple CEO,
Tim Cook and Google CEO Sundar Pichai.
He said, quote, I am writing the two of you because it is clear that TikTok poses
an unacceptable national security risk due to its extensive data harvesting
being combined with Beijing's apparently unchecked access to that sensitive data.
It's kind of amazing that all of a sudden the FCC is concerned about social media
platforms collecting our data.
Now TikTok, he says in that same letter, collects everything from search and
browsing histories to keystroke patterns and
biometric identifiers including face prints.
Which researchers have said might be used in unrelated facial recognition
technology and voice prints.
Now, how dare they do that over at China?
Don't they know that US based companies need to do that on behalf of
the United States [LAUGH], anyway, let me keep going.
It collects location data as well as draft messages and
metadata, plus it has collected the text images and
videos that are stored on a device's clipboard.
Now, listen, I don't deny that TikTok is doing
what Brendan Carr is saying they're doing.
In fact there was an investigation done by Buzzfeed News on this matter.
They released it last week and it revealed that employees in China have
repeatedly accessed non-public user data from the United States.
By the way, this US data was often accessed as part of
an initiative that was ironically called Project Texas.
And Projects Texas is an ongoing effort to move all of
TikTok's US data into a data storage center in Texas.
Now, again, Donald Trump is the person who nominated Carr for
this position back in 2007.
His term began in 2018 and will last through 2023,
that's why he's still part of the FCC.
But, I have an issue with this, not because I don't believe that TikTok is
collecting our data and accessing sensitive information about us.
It's just that every social media platform,
every website does this, and I wish they were more concerned
about the general issue of private information being accessed.
And sold to third parties by corporations, whether they be in China or
the United States.
>> Absolutely,
yeah, terrifying what Cambridge Analytica did in the 2020 election.
That was really the first time that I realized how serious data misuse is, where
they took people's data from Facebook by the way, an American based company.
And they identified who on Facebook was a persuadable voter and
then Cambridge Analytica targeted them with misinformation.
There are many rumors that this did influence the 2020 election of
course that's disputed, but it's scary that it's even a possibility.
And will as a selenium who likes using TikTok be upset if Biden bands it,
of course dopamine is really hard to come by these days.
But the point is is that I'm not any safer if it's a us based corporation stealing
my data, then if it's a company in China, it really doesn't make a difference to me.
And I think that there's a deeper reason for why they're considering this, and
I will say that on TikTok there's a lot of political content.
There's a lot of political organizing happening,
there's a lot of education happening.
It's turned into a public forum where people can be radicalized with the amount
of information that's on there and can be shared.
A lot of people have learned a lot about their politics on TikTok and
I use my TikTok account to do the same thing.
Do I think the US Government is scared of this?
Of course, absolutely, and so I think if TikTok is banned,
we need someone to purchase perhaps the back end code to program a similar app.
And how the US based company provide the exact same service as TikTok does.
Because it's at this point important and
a part of the public square in the United States, I think it's that serious.
Even though a lot of people say it's a silly dancing app,
it's a lot deeper than that.
>> Yeah, I agree with you on that wholeheartedly.
I do think that the US Government concerned about people
using TikTok to get political messages out is part of it.
But I do think that the bigger issue for them is just like
their bitterness and antagonistic view toward China.
And this really started to blow up during Obama's administration
when he made the so called pivot to Asia.
And really at the heart of it is the fact that we have through
our economic policies, through allowing for
corporations to exploit cheap labor in other countries like China.
Have made China and its economy much stronger to the point where it's now
a serious competitor to the United States.
And we've been selling weapons to a country surrounding Russia that
we consider our allies.
As a result and in response to that China has been bolstering its own military and
its own weaponry.
And so, this is when they mentioned national security,
that is what they're referring to because they're not actually
concerned about our personal data being collected.
Our personal data gets collected all the time.
And in fact, Brendan Carr addressed that during an interview with CNBC,
I actually haven't seen this video yet.
So, let's take a look at that.
>> Commissioner Carr, you're going after TikTok,
this is a Chinese company that's operating in America.
But what about American companies in China like Apple?
Is there a double standard here in response to a 2017 Chinese law?
Apple agreed to move its Chinese customers data to China,
and onto computers owned and run by Chinese state owned company.
Isn't that a concern, should this be broader ranging,
should lawmakers be looking at this?
>> Absolutely, I'm deeply concerned about some of the hypocrisy we see from
Silicon Valley companies.
Again, these are companies that stand up and say, look,
we back human rights, we back privacy and yet in their dealings with China.
We see a lot of double standards in terms of their continuing to invest,
there continue to put US user data at risk.
And I do think this should be part and
part of a broader look at securing US data.
>> But why aren't you doing something about it,
like why is TikTok the only thing that he has taken action on?
It just doesn't really seem like he's concerned about what US companies
are up to.
Anyway, all right, well, the other final thing I'll say about
this is even though Biden isn't the one pushing for this,
it's this FCC member, fact of the matter is people will blame Biden for it.
And look, I don't even really care, I can't stand Biden at this point,
he just struck a deal with Mitch McConnell to appoint a Federal Judge in Kentucky,
a lifetime judgeship.
And this judges, potential judge is awful, anti-abortion, extreme right winger.
Why would you strike a deal with the devil like that?
So stupid, anyway, but with that said,
if I wanted to give Biden advice or just forecast what's gonna happen.
He's already lost a lot of support among young people and
banning TikTok will make it worse.
Biden's approval rating with voters under 30 has dropped 23 points since the first
months of his presidency and that's according to Gallup.
Final word, Jessica go ahead.
>> Yeah, I think you're absolutely right that this is about US competition
with China.
It's about the United States under Donald Trump was pushing
extremely nationalist rhetoric.
And Biden is essentially continuing that kind of approach to foreign
policy with this.
We have people like Edward Snowden saying that, hey, it's been known for
a long time that foreigners data is collected by US based corporations.
And so, how can we engage in a respectable manner on the international stage if we
are playing by different standards than we expect other nations to?
Not only that, but it's absolutely backwards to assume that
the United States has to compete with every other country for hegemony.
The idea that the United States needs to be number one with having
such an outsized spending on defense and
such a huge military compared to every single other nation.
It is a waste of money when you think about,
what are the things that make people happy?
What are the things that give people a good life?
Why are we competing with china over who is the biggest and best country and
most powerful country in the world?
Instead of thinking how can we collaborate to face this global issue of climate
change that quite literally requires international collaboration,
wines that are we competing with other countries and focusing the energy on that.
I thought biden was going to usher in a new era where we actually don't look at
globalism as something to be afraid of and
actually realize That it is necessary for human advancement.
It's insane.
It feels like we're back in the 1950s this week in the United States, honestly.
Yeah, worse than that in a lot of ways.