Despite what you've been told, the U.S. government is serious about privacy and data. And the TikTok divestment is just one prong of a bigger strategy.
My understanding is that the issue with the bill is not divestiture of TikTok to a US entity but that it also conveys new power to the executive branch, i.e., whoever is president, to declare any future similar entity a national security threat at their whim and shut them down unilaterally without congressional buy in.
As always, Matt, you nail it. It is so important that the Biden administration is moving simultaneously on several fronts. The world of social media is changing so rapidly with so many profound impacts on our lives, especially young voters, that our freedoms may be sucked out of us through the little screens in our hands if we do not find someway to eliminate rampant misinformation.
Many, myself included, will remain extremely suspicious of the actual motives behind this sudden kumbaya bipartisan agreement at warp speed. And I think the suspicion is well warranted.
I don’t understand why you aren’t crediting the free speech concerns that are raised by Glen Greenwald. I would love to see the two of you discuss this topic.
I had the pleasure of hearing Lina Khan being interviewed at a Yale Law School event last week. She touched on the FTC's use of both unfairness and deception as a basis for consumer protection action.
I have to say I find the idea that TikTok has been targeted because there is too much "malinformation" , ie "things that are true that the ruling class does not want you to hear" to be a compelling argument.
For instance, look at how TikTok has revealed Israeli war crimes.
With both parties rushing towards platforms of censorship for the benefit of the donor class, it's hard to not become paranoid.
Great explanation, Matt! I find data and advertising stuff complex and confusing; I’m going to read this again, and I listened to your full interview on Useful Idiots a few years back (your second appearance on their show) several times before I fully understood it. Any chance you, AELP, or someone else makes some “data, advertising, privacy, and security for dummies” video/audio content any time soon?
Relatedly, federal agencies have ramped up efforts re: cybersecurity.
- SEC recently enacted new rules requiring public companies to "disclose risk management and governance information in relation to cybersecurity, including board proficiency and oversight of cybersecurity risk" in their 10-k/20-f filings and also quick reporting of data breaches. https://www.thomsonreuters.com/en-us/posts/government/sec-cybersecurity-rules/
- Since 2018, an interagency committee called CFIUS that reviews foreign investments/transactions has been ramping up scrutiny of deals involving significant foreign control of critical infrastructure or sensitive data. https://www.whitecase.com/insight-alert/cfius-finalizes-new-firrma-regulations CFIUS has stopped and even unwound deals in a variety of sectors in the last few years. This is something that startup financings or acquisitions involving foreign investors have to think about pretty routinely now when they're structuring deals. he National Venture Capital Association revised its model templates a few years ago to include language specifically addressing CFIUS.
So anyway; just underscoring Matt's point that there really is bigger picture movement on privacy & security despite not having a comprehensive federal privacy law yet.
(I'll also note that plenty of privacy professionals who aren't lobbyists know that a "notice and consent" regulatory model that just require disclosing sleazy things rather than not doing them is not a good system).
The bill expands executive powers for the president to shut down apps and websites deemed to be controlled by foreign adversaries, loosely defined. Similar to how the Patriot Act first defined foreign adversaries as Iraq, Afghanistan and then expanded under Bush’s own lawyers to include “little old ladies in Sweden” if they so determine.
Read the bill and look at the history of the national security state abusing individual freedoms regardless of which party is in power. This will threaten speech on all corners of the internet.
I expected a more critical lens from BIG; after all, what’s bigger than the Fed?
“If a nation state is opaque, authoritarian, and doesn’t allow foreign journalists, they don’t get the benefit of the doubt on intentions when it comes to whether private firms are in fact private, especially when the state ideology is collectivis”. Matt, love your quote and other logical rationale. China has a long history of using propaganda for their ends….one can also look at what they did with the “ Psychological Manipulation of Korean War American POWs” ….
Thanks as always Matt. Without your insight most everyone would not have access to the information needed to understand one of the most pressing topics of our time.
We, the people need to make decisions on how to regulate these platforms. It is imperative to weed out the misinformation and bad actors to save democracy. The United States government needs to demonstrate our sovereignty to countries like China and Russia that we will make decisions that are for the benefit of American citizens.
Anti monopoly?? The two cartel parties are the most toxic monopolies to real democracy that could possibly be devised. They should be broken up so there are at least four parties and voting changed to proportional representation instead of this winner-take-all madness. We are ranked at number 30 as a "flawed democracy" rather than as a true, functioning democracy because of this two-headed cartel.
I'm shocked that the industry of data brokers listened to consumer preferences. My experience led me to believe they were a bunch of sadists, gloating over how they could amass data, regardless of turning off location settings, and rejecting all unecessary cookies. Who knew, some of them cared about people's privacy preferences?
I'm glad to note the FTC argued that collecting and using some kinds of data was unfair, whether truthfully disclosed, or not. That just makes intuitive sense.
Kudos to the judge who ruled for the FTC in the Kochava case, upholding unfairness as grounds for - - - well, I'd say, ANYTHING! Regardless of if an entity disclosed what they were going to do with the data. Duh! I had to laugh at your phrasing: "Basically, a judge said, yeah, that old FTC law that says ‘unfair and deceptive practices’ are illegal does actually apply to sleazy uses of data, not just lying about how sleazy you are." Really drives an obvious point home.
It was surprising to learn that China doesn’t let American platforms in China, and requires data localization. Yet they have TikTok, here. That's a one way street.
Once upon a time I got a phone. TikTok was preloaded on it. I came across something somewhere, that said even if I didn't activate it, TikTok still collected data on me. So I tried to uninstall it. It didn't budge. I brought the matter to the attention of CISA.gov, and they waived some magic wand, and fixed the problem. So they are definitely ON the ball, with internet and public utility matters (especially, since we seem to be viewing social media as public utilities, these days.).
My understanding is that the issue with the bill is not divestiture of TikTok to a US entity but that it also conveys new power to the executive branch, i.e., whoever is president, to declare any future similar entity a national security threat at their whim and shut them down unilaterally without congressional buy in.
As always, Matt, you nail it. It is so important that the Biden administration is moving simultaneously on several fronts. The world of social media is changing so rapidly with so many profound impacts on our lives, especially young voters, that our freedoms may be sucked out of us through the little screens in our hands if we do not find someway to eliminate rampant misinformation.
Many, myself included, will remain extremely suspicious of the actual motives behind this sudden kumbaya bipartisan agreement at warp speed. And I think the suspicion is well warranted.
I don’t understand why you aren’t crediting the free speech concerns that are raised by Glen Greenwald. I would love to see the two of you discuss this topic.
I had the pleasure of hearing Lina Khan being interviewed at a Yale Law School event last week. She touched on the FTC's use of both unfairness and deception as a basis for consumer protection action.
I hope any closer look into the TikTok ownership also leads to a closer look at the Saudi investment in Twitter.
I have to say I find the idea that TikTok has been targeted because there is too much "malinformation" , ie "things that are true that the ruling class does not want you to hear" to be a compelling argument.
For instance, look at how TikTok has revealed Israeli war crimes.
With both parties rushing towards platforms of censorship for the benefit of the donor class, it's hard to not become paranoid.
Great explanation, Matt! I find data and advertising stuff complex and confusing; I’m going to read this again, and I listened to your full interview on Useful Idiots a few years back (your second appearance on their show) several times before I fully understood it. Any chance you, AELP, or someone else makes some “data, advertising, privacy, and security for dummies” video/audio content any time soon?
Relatedly, federal agencies have ramped up efforts re: cybersecurity.
- SEC recently enacted new rules requiring public companies to "disclose risk management and governance information in relation to cybersecurity, including board proficiency and oversight of cybersecurity risk" in their 10-k/20-f filings and also quick reporting of data breaches. https://www.thomsonreuters.com/en-us/posts/government/sec-cybersecurity-rules/
- FCC recently took action against some cell providers for using easily hackable default passwords, and also revamped its data breach rules for the first time in 16 years https://www.natlawreview.com/article/fcc-cpni-certification-and-privacy-rules-update It's also working more closely with state agencies and that may lead to more rulemaking https://www.wiley.law/alert-FCC-Expands-Privacy-and-Data-Protection-Work-with-States-to-Increase-Investigations
- In 2023, CISA & FEMA launched a joint "first-of-its-kind cybersecurity grant program specifically for state, local and territorial governments across the country" https://www.cisa.gov/news-events/news/cisa-releases-2023-year-review-showcasing-efforts-protect-critical-infrastructure
- In 2022, Congress enacted a strict data breach reporting law for "critical infrastructure" industries https://www.cisa.gov/news-events/news/circia-one-year-look-behind-scenes
- Biden had an executive order on cybersecurity in 2021 that kicked off a lot of this https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/05/12/executive-order-on-improving-the-nations-cybersecurity/
- Since 2018, an interagency committee called CFIUS that reviews foreign investments/transactions has been ramping up scrutiny of deals involving significant foreign control of critical infrastructure or sensitive data. https://www.whitecase.com/insight-alert/cfius-finalizes-new-firrma-regulations CFIUS has stopped and even unwound deals in a variety of sectors in the last few years. This is something that startup financings or acquisitions involving foreign investors have to think about pretty routinely now when they're structuring deals. he National Venture Capital Association revised its model templates a few years ago to include language specifically addressing CFIUS.
So anyway; just underscoring Matt's point that there really is bigger picture movement on privacy & security despite not having a comprehensive federal privacy law yet.
(I'll also note that plenty of privacy professionals who aren't lobbyists know that a "notice and consent" regulatory model that just require disclosing sleazy things rather than not doing them is not a good system).
I trust China more than Mnuchin
I'm not sure replacing Chinese censorship of TikTok with American censorship is much of a win.
The bill expands executive powers for the president to shut down apps and websites deemed to be controlled by foreign adversaries, loosely defined. Similar to how the Patriot Act first defined foreign adversaries as Iraq, Afghanistan and then expanded under Bush’s own lawyers to include “little old ladies in Sweden” if they so determine.
Read the bill and look at the history of the national security state abusing individual freedoms regardless of which party is in power. This will threaten speech on all corners of the internet.
I expected a more critical lens from BIG; after all, what’s bigger than the Fed?
“If a nation state is opaque, authoritarian, and doesn’t allow foreign journalists, they don’t get the benefit of the doubt on intentions when it comes to whether private firms are in fact private, especially when the state ideology is collectivis”. Matt, love your quote and other logical rationale. China has a long history of using propaganda for their ends….one can also look at what they did with the “ Psychological Manipulation of Korean War American POWs” ….
Thanks as always Matt. Without your insight most everyone would not have access to the information needed to understand one of the most pressing topics of our time.
We, the people need to make decisions on how to regulate these platforms. It is imperative to weed out the misinformation and bad actors to save democracy. The United States government needs to demonstrate our sovereignty to countries like China and Russia that we will make decisions that are for the benefit of American citizens.
Anti monopoly?? The two cartel parties are the most toxic monopolies to real democracy that could possibly be devised. They should be broken up so there are at least four parties and voting changed to proportional representation instead of this winner-take-all madness. We are ranked at number 30 as a "flawed democracy" rather than as a true, functioning democracy because of this two-headed cartel.
I'm shocked that the industry of data brokers listened to consumer preferences. My experience led me to believe they were a bunch of sadists, gloating over how they could amass data, regardless of turning off location settings, and rejecting all unecessary cookies. Who knew, some of them cared about people's privacy preferences?
I'm glad to note the FTC argued that collecting and using some kinds of data was unfair, whether truthfully disclosed, or not. That just makes intuitive sense.
Kudos to the judge who ruled for the FTC in the Kochava case, upholding unfairness as grounds for - - - well, I'd say, ANYTHING! Regardless of if an entity disclosed what they were going to do with the data. Duh! I had to laugh at your phrasing: "Basically, a judge said, yeah, that old FTC law that says ‘unfair and deceptive practices’ are illegal does actually apply to sleazy uses of data, not just lying about how sleazy you are." Really drives an obvious point home.
It was surprising to learn that China doesn’t let American platforms in China, and requires data localization. Yet they have TikTok, here. That's a one way street.
Once upon a time I got a phone. TikTok was preloaded on it. I came across something somewhere, that said even if I didn't activate it, TikTok still collected data on me. So I tried to uninstall it. It didn't budge. I brought the matter to the attention of CISA.gov, and they waived some magic wand, and fixed the problem. So they are definitely ON the ball, with internet and public utility matters (especially, since we seem to be viewing social media as public utilities, these days.).