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Behind the Merlina Challenge, the memory of Khabane Lame and the choreographies of Noelgoescrazy is TikTok. Behind the application that according to Hootsuite arrives to over a billion adults, there’s Bytedance. And behind the Beijing-based tech company, the all-powerful Chinese government is lurking with legislation that, in March, forced it to share its algorithms under the guise of determining if they fit.”within the regulatory framework”. Like this app, Alibaba and Tencent also revealed their most precious secrets to the Cyberspace Administration of China.
Seeing the power of Xi Jinping governmentin USA They’re afraid that China have easy access to the information that is recorded there. After the attempt of former president donald trump to prohibit downloads of TikTokthe government of Maryland it approaches the problem in another way: it has prohibited the use of this and other Apps with Chinese and Russian headquarters in the State’s computer networks. From your perspective, Deleting the app from public devices is necessary to prevent cyber espionage.
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The states of South Dakota, Wisconsin, Indiana and South Carolina have also taken similar restrictive measures.
do they exaggerate? according to their terms and Conditions, TikTok collects information about the used device (model, operating system, screen resolution, “names and types of applications and files, keystroke patterns or rhythms, battery status, IP address, mobile phone operator”), websites visited, apps downloaded, and purchases. In addition, on multimedia content works the “identification of the objects and setting that appear, the existence and location within an image of the features and attributes of the face and body, the nature of the audio and text of the spoken words”. And that, when required by law, will share everything collectedwith public safety agencies or regulatory entities”.
About that fear political scientist specialized in political communication Alexandra Morales Remember that these types of platforms work that way, only there are not so many problems with those that are American. “One would have to think that these types of decisions have to do with secret information handled by the Government. But there is already a tendency to block the use of platforms like this in official state accounts.”.
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A Trojan horse?
“That TikTok I owe so much respect to China and that it can steal information from us to use it for its benefit, generates uncertainty -He says Miguel Sánchez Ferrán, political analyst and Panamanian specialist in international business-. In this sense, the measures taken by some State offices may work, but ordinary people will continue to use the application because of all it is the most entertaining “.
Indeed, TikTok seems to be unstoppable. It is not only the algorithm, says Sánchez Ferrán, the videos offer information “chewed” fun way. As a result and as recorded by the Reuters Institute in its Digital News Reportthe application is located behind Facebook, Youtube Y WhatsApp as the preferred one for information, doubling its attractiveness (7%) compared to 2021.
If you remember the scandal of Cambridge Analytica -and the personality tests that, as the BBC recalls, led to “data theft, political interference and blackmail with prostitutes” and included platforms such as Facebook-, Are we facing a Trojan horse?
Morales concludes: “What bothers you USA is that China is collecting all that information. Let’s say it’s a bit hypocritical because they were the first developers of those platforms. But what we cannot ignore is that, although we believe that we know the real power of social networks, we still cannot measure it 100%.”.
Source: Elcomercio
I am Jack Morton and I work in 24 News Recorder. I mostly cover world news and I have also authored 24 news recorder. I find this work highly interesting and it allows me to keep up with current events happening around the world.
