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Comment by shripadk | Hacker News Reader

Yes it is political. It is CCP controlled company. How is that hard to imagine? Yes this is a problem of National Security. India was the first to ban these apps. I don't see you having a problem there! But if US does it, it pains you. Why? Is National Security a concern only for Countries except US? Why is US an exception in your argument? If China can ban foreign apps why can't other Countries do the same? I don't understand your logic at all!

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With your logic, FB and Twitter has strong ties with US government and controlled by them. Should all countries ban, attack and try to eliminate FB and Twitter from their markets?

"Controlled by them". This is so wrong! If the US Government controls FB and Twitter you wouldn't have FB censoring Trump ads and Twitter attaching its own fact check opinions on Trump's tweets. By all evidence you have FB and Twitter functioning completely independent of the US Government. Does it share data with the US Government based on some legal requirement? Yes it does. As long as the requirement is legal. I am against social media companies as well but for the completely opposite reason. I believe social media companies are acting as Supra-National Governments and they have powers to influence that even National Governments (like the US in this case) do not have. They can literally alter the political discourse and no one can do anything about it. Not even the US Government. I have expressed my opinions about social media here which you can read for yourself [1]

Don't be surprised if there is a ban on FB and Twitter by other countries too! But not for the reasons you mentioned. The reason would be undue political interference if there is evidence of the same.

But TikTok is not like FB or Twitter. The parent company ByteDance has direct affiliation with CCP. They have an actual agreement in place where they will share any and every data with the CCP even without any legal basis. This is not the case in the US. The US Government has to get a court order to get information from FB or Twitter.

Here is a quote from Twitter's Law Enforcement page [2]:

"Private information requires a subpoena or court order

Non-public information about Twitter users will not be released to law enforcement except in response to appropriate legal process such as a subpoena, court order, or other valid legal process – or in response to a valid emergency request, as described below."

And if the US Government wants communications details it needs to obtain a Search warrant [2]:

"Contents of communications requires a search warrant

Requests for the contents of communications (e.g., Tweets, Direct Messages, photos) require a valid search warrant or equivalent from an agency with proper jurisdiction over Twitter."

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23774779

[2]: https://help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-policies/twitter-law-e...

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