Sunday, September 20th, 2020. This was the day where 2 of the biggest social networks in the world were to be banned from the US market. Yet, TikTok & WeChat are still very well available on the American AppStore and Google Play store. So what happened?
It has long been announced that Donald Trump wanted to ban TikTik and WeChat from accessing American customers. The base for this ban came from claims from the president that the companies are not only collecting the personal data of American users, just like other social media, but also providing it to the Chinese government. Whether these claims are founded or not is another debate. Nevertheless, the American Departement of Commerce still released a directive to prevent the two platforms from being downloaded in the country. So why are they not banned yet?
On the one hand, it turns out that TikTok prevented its ban by agreeing to a deal with both Oracle & Wallmart in order to create a new business entity and avoid the ban altogether. The president agreed to extend the deadline by a week in a sign of good faith. On the other hand, in regard to WeChat, the situation is very different. A judge prevented the ban by blocking the decision. This was made under the assumption this ban was contradictory with WeChat’s first amendment rights. In fact, WeChat claims that the government would be discriminating against Chinese-Americans as the platform has vital importance for the community. It is still unknown for now whether these claims will hold.
All in all, I believe this undoubtedly marks a new low in Chinese-American relations solely based on the assumptions of their current president. I find it quite paradoxical to denounce WeChat and TikTok for their personal data use especially after massive privacy breaches from American companies like Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica scandal. I am convinced, of course, that online privacy is a crucial concern in our day and age. However, I don’t think restrictions and regulations should be based on political battles but rather on fundamental rights. What do you think?
References
Lyons, K. (2020) TikTok and WeChat both managed to avoid their Sunday bans. The Verge. Retrieved from: https://www.theverge.com/2020/9/20/21447702/tiktok-wechat-avoid-ban-china-trump-apps
Allyn, B. (2020). TikTok Ban Averted: Trump Gives Oracle-Walmart Deal His ‘Blessing’. NPR. Retrieved from: https://www.npr.org/2020/09/20/914032065/tiktok-ban-averted-trump-gives-oracle-walmart-deal-his-blessing?t=1600721586302
Hi Daniel,
Trump views the world in a binary way of good and evil. Is he biased and unreflective to things such as FB and Cambridge Analytica? – Yes. Does he, however, in general raise the right topic to discuss on the big political stage? – Yes.
If we think about the massive advertisement revennues of FB and Google for instance, it is hard to assume that we receive the appropriate return for letting our data be used. Also data makes us readible which is good and bad. I once, did a professional personality test and within 15 minutes, my whole personality with a 95% accuracy was predicted. I think data gives us a lot of opportunities e.g. in the medtech field but we should strive for a responsible way in which data is used and in the best case we should have complete control over it as an individual.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this social media topic Daniel. I think The Great Hack is a great example of the issues at hand and the fact that as you stated, social media companies around the world must take responsibility for privacy concerns. Another Netflix recommendation with regards to this topic is The Social Dilemma. I think it links quite well to the topic which you discussed!
Great read! I agree with you, I do not believe that restrictions should come from political issues. If the US were to ban the use of TikTok, it would restrict its population, which is a large portion of the users, to be completely free in doing what they like. This goes against what the US sends for, which shows that this decision is completely political. Curious to see how this will evolve!