Who uses TikTok for sensitive information? Government access to TikTok user data is of limited additional value compared to whatever TikTok sells to large advertisers and analytics partners.
When you couple this with the fact that China had secret police stations in the US trying to capture Chinese dissidents, you could use such data to track those people to kidnap them, regardless of if the information was sensitive on the app or not.
This is like saying "When you couple 30 seconds of girls dancing with assault rifles, it could kill you."
China policing emigres in the US is way out of bounds and I dare you to find anyone who thinks otherwise. Whereas posting on any social media and expecting that post to not be seen by foreign adversaries is... what?
It's multiple countries that have had issues with them e.g. Australia, Canada, Ireland.
And I personally know of students here in Australia who have been targeted by the Chinese consulate for participating in pro-Taiwan and pro-HK protests. So the idea that they wouldn't apply this technique to people of all ages isn't far-fetched.
> U.S. Asks to Drop Case Accusing N.Y.P.D. Officer of Spying for China
> The charges against Officer Angwang came amid growing concern on the part of law enforcement authorities in the United States and other Western countries about Beijing’s efforts to monitor Chinese nationals abroad, including dissidents.
> Prosecutors cited recorded phone calls in charging Officer Angwang and said he had reported regularly to two Chinese consular officials in New York on the activities of ethnic Tibetans. One of the officials was responsible for “neutralizing sources of potential opposition to the policies and authority” opposed to the Chinese government’s policies and authority, court filings said.
> But Mr. Carman, Officer Angwang’s lawyer, argued that the conversations described by prosecutors as “nefarious” were actually “pedestrian” efforts by his client to maintain good relations with Chinese officials so that he could obtain a visa to visit his parents in China and to introduce them to his daughter.
Is this the threshold of credulity now for extraordinary claims? The authorities arrested people so they must have done something wrong? This way of thinking seems fraught historically.
i know these probably just look like "fun videos" and most are likely of no consequence, but my guess is some of the military footage submitted on there is recent and potentially not in the interest of US national defense.
the value of china gaining that info is immeasurable. specifically, what im saying we are underestimating the amount and value of the data even this one example provides to china. That was just one search
okay for example. weapon/equipment types, base locations, squad sizes, army morale, etc.. Does that not make sense? You can glean a lot from those videos. I cant possibly name every one
