US Intelligence Department admitted, the threat of TikTok is completely imaginary

perceived threat The Chinese spying frenzy toward TikTok has ballooned to proportions that threaten U.S. national security, but the official record tells a different story: U.S. intelligence has provided no evidence that the popular social media site ever coordinated with Beijing. This fact hasn’t stopped many in Congress and even President Joe Biden from promoting legislation that would force the sale of the app, as TikTok mania fills news pages with empty speculation and insinuations. .

In interviews and testimony given to Congress about TikTok, the leaders of the FBI, CIA, and Director of National Intelligence have indeed been careful to dismiss the national security threat posed by TikTok as entirely hypothetical. With access to most of the government’s sensitive intelligence information, they are well placed to know.

The basic allegation is that TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, a Chinese company, was accused by the government in Beijing of manipulating public opinion, collecting mass data on Americans, and even spying on individual users. You may be forced to use your app in targeted operations. (TIC Toc They say It has never shared US user data with the Chinese government and would not do so if asked. This week, TikTok CEO Shaw Chew Said ByteDance “has no CCP ownership”, referring to the Chinese Communist Party.

While top national security officials seem happy to repeat these allegations of Chinese control over TikTok, they avoid saying that China has ever actually coordinated with the company.

specific one is Interview CIA Director William Burns spoke to CNN in 2022, where he said it was “disturbing to see what the Chinese government can do to manipulate TikTok.” Not what the Chinese government has done, but what it can do.

What China can do becomes a recurring theme in statements by top national security officials.

FBI Director Christopher Wray said during 2022 to talk The University of Michigan states that TikTok’s “parent company is controlled by the Chinese government, and it gives them Possibility (emphasis added) The app is taken advantage of in ways that I think we should be concerned about.” allows manipulation and if they want (emphasis added), to use it for influence operations.”

In the same conversation, Ray mentioned three times the Chinese government’s “ability” to spy on TikTok users, but once again stopped short of saying that they do.

“They also have the ability to collect data on users through this that can be used for traditional espionage operations,” Ray said. “They also have the ability to get access to it, they have the necessary access to the software tools. So you’re talking about millions of devices and it gives them the ability to engage in different types of malicious cyber activities through it.

According to US intelligence, Ray is referring to the potential ability to command phones and computers that connect to TikTok through the apps and website.

In testimony Appearing before the House Homeland Security Committee in November 2022, Ray was even more cautious, emphasizing that the Chinese government could use TikTok for foreign influence operations, but only “if they want to.” When Rep. Diana Harshbarger, R-Tenn., asked whether the Chinese government has used TikTok to collect information about Americans for purposes other than targeted ads and content, Wray could only acknowledge that it is a There was a “possibility”.

“I would say we have national security concerns, at least from the FBI, regarding TikTok,” Wray said. “They include the possibility that the Chinese government could use it to control data collection on millions of users or control recommendation algorithms that could be used for foreign influence operations if they wanted.”

The lack of evidence is not due to lack of effort, as Ray pointed out during the same hearing. When Harshbarger asked what was being done to investigate the Chinese government’s involvement in TikTok, Wray responded that he would see if “any specific investigative work can be included in the classified briefing I referenced.”

When the FBI was asked by The Intercept whether it had any evidence that TikTok coordinated with the Chinese government, it cited Wray’s prior statements – several of which are quoted in this article. An FBI spokesperson said, “We have nothing to add to the director’s comments.”

Fiscal Year 2025 FBI Budget Demand The bill to Congress, which outlines its resource priorities in the coming year, was unveiled this week but makes no mention of TikTok in its 94 pages. Actually, there is no mention of China in this.

Since at least 2020, the Interagency Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States has investigated the implications of the acquisition of TikTok by ByteDance. The investigation follows an executive order from former President Donald Trump that sought to force TikTok to separate from its parent company. Congress disappointed when that investigation failed to force the sale. decided To add to this, the House passed legislation on Wednesday that would force ByteDance to sell TikTok.

In testimony At the House Intelligence Committee on Tuesday, Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines, the highest-ranking intelligence official in the US government, was asked about the possibility that China could use TikTok to influence the upcoming 2024 presidential election. Haines only said that there cannot be any relaxation in this.

“We can’t rule out that the CCP could use it,” Haynes said.

The relatively measured tone adopted by top intelligence officials is in sharp contrast to the warnings emanating from Congress. In 2022, Representative Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., considered TikTok a “digital fentanyl”, co-authoring it. pillar Senator Marco Rubio, R-Fla., in The Washington Post. There was a demand to ban TikTok. Gallagher and Rubio introduced later Legislation To do so, a further 39 states, at the time of this writing, have banned the use of TikTok on government devices.

None of this is to say that China hasn’t used TikTok to influence public opinion and, even, to try to interfere in US elections. “TikTok accounts run by the (People’s Republic of China) propaganda arm allegedly targeted candidates from both political parties during the US midterm election cycle in 2022,” They say The annual Intelligence Community Threat Assessment was released Monday. But the assessment provided no evidence that TikTok had coordinated with the Chinese government. In fact, governments – including the United States – have been known to use social media to influence public opinion abroad.

“The problem with TikTok is not related to their ownership; This is a problem of surveillance capitalism, and that’s true of all social media companies,” computer security expert Bruce Schneier told The Intercept. “The Russians did this with Facebook in 2016 and they didn’t have to own Facebook – they just bought ads like everyone else.”

This week, Reuters informed of As President, Trump signed a covert action order authorizing the CIA to use social media to influence and manipulate domestic Chinese public opinion and views on China. Other covert US cyber influence programs are known to exist in connection with Russia, Iran, terrorist groups, and other foreign actors.

In other words, everyone is doing it.