The US House of Representatives is due to vote on a bill giving Chinese owner ByteDance about six months to sell that part of its business

China could use social media app TikTok to influence the 2024 US elections, the director of national intelligence, Avril Haines, has told a House of Representatives intelligence committee hearing.

Asked by Democratic Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi if China’s ruling Communist party (CCP) would use TikTok to influence the elections, Haines said “we cannot rule out that the CCP would use it”.

Lawmakers have long voiced concerns that the Chinese government could access user data or influence what people see on the app, including pushing content to stoke US political divisions.

  • turkishdelight
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    8 months ago

    Is America not doing the same globally with Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and others?

    • gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      Hell, we already know China used Facebook to do this during the last American midterms (and has purchased all sorts of data from FB), but since they have an older user base that lawmakers figure is more likely to vote than TikTok-ers it’s not getting singled out for this special treatment

      e; specified which midterms I was talking about

      • turkishdelight
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        8 months ago

        I’m more worried about American propaganda. America is known for supporting coups in my country.