The platform made the disclosure as part of its legal challenge against a law forcing its sale in the US.

TikTok says it offered the US government the power to shut the platform down in an attempt to address lawmakers’ data protection and national security concerns.

It disclosed the “kill switch” offer, which it made in 2022, as it began its legal fight against legislation that will ban the app in America unless Chinese parent company ByteDance sells it.

The law has been introduced because of concerns TikTok might share US user data with the Chinese government - claims it and ByteDance have always denied.

TikTok and ByteDance are urging the courts to strike the legislation down.

“This law is a radical departure from this country’s tradition of championing an open Internet, and sets a dangerous precedent allowing the political branches to target a disfavored speech platform and force it to sell or be shut down,” they argued in their legal submission.

They also claimed the US government refused to engage in any serious settlement talks after 2022, and pointed to the “kill switch” offer as evidence of the lengths they had been prepared to go.

  • SteveEnglish
    4313·
    5 months ago

    The law has been introduced because of concerns TikTok might share US user data with the Chinese government - claims it and ByteDance have always denied.

    That was never the major issue.
    It’s about the Chinese Government tweaking the algorithm to very subtly shift public opinion. Something we know they’re doing already.

    • darthskull@lemmy.ca
      186·
      5 months ago

      No they don’t care about that. They know foreign governments do that all the time on Facebook, YouTube, Reddit, etc. This is about protecting lobbyists’ business interests, and right now the biggest lobbyists and campain contributors are also tik tok’s competitors.

      • SteveEnglish
        83·
        5 months ago

        Posting things to a site, is fundamentally different from actually owning the site; And adjusting the algorithm to promote or suppress specific ideas. Foreign governments don’t have that ability. Not in the domestic US versions anyway.

        There are several reasons to do it. Lobbyist are another.

    • ssj2marx@lemmy.ml
      8·
      5 months ago

      the Chinese Government tweaking the algorithm to very subtly shift public opinion

      A new report said that Uyghur hashtags were used more often on Instagram than on TikTok

      The study the article is talking about does not say what you allege it does. Just off the top of my head, two possible explanations are a) if Tiktok is associated with China in the public consciousness, then it stands to reason that it will attract fewer users who are critical of China and more users who are aligned with it, and b) Tiktok simply suppresses all controversial topics regardless of political agenda because it has determined that inoffensive content is more profitable.

      The second one seems the most likely to me - remember that Tiktok is the reason why kids say “unalive” because they’re afraid that the word “kill” will get picked up by auto moderation and prevent their post from being shared.

    • NevermindNoMind@lemmy.world
      96·
      5 months ago

      Even if tik tok was nakedly controlled by the Chinese government, who gives a shit? I can go over to RT (Russia Today) right now and get fed Russian propaganda. Hell, until 2022 I could add it to my cable package. I can to this day still get it as a satellite TV option. If the concern is “foreign government may influence public opinion on a platform they control” then the US has a lot of banning to do.

      But we don’t because free speech is a thing and we’re free to consume whatever propaganda we want.

      We gave up that principle because “China bad” (and the CCP is, to be clear). But instead of passing laws around data privacy, or algorithmic transparency, or a public information campaign to get kids off of tik tok, the US government went straight to “The government will decide what information your allowed to consume, we know what’s best for you” and far too many people are cheering.

      Besides, the point your making is bullshit anyway given the kill switch mechanism Tik Tok offered.

      TikTok was banned because 1) China bad, and 2) Tik Tok is eating US social media companies lunch. Facebook and Twitter and Google throw some campaign donations at the politicians that killed their biggest rival, and the politicians calculate that more people hate tik tok than like it (or care about preventing government censorship if the thing being censored is something they don’t like). It’s honestly one of the grossest things I seen dems support lately.

    • dezmd@lemmy.worldMEnglish
      611·
      5 months ago

      It was always about butthurt Trump opening the floodgates on the idea of banning it after TikTokers kept attacks on him trending.

      It’s brainwashed lunacy to the point of propaganda to continually claim it’s over China using the platform to sway public opinion. They can and do use EVERY platform to do that.

      You think even Lemmy is immune?

      • SteveEnglish
        94·
        5 months ago

        There is a substantial difference between posting content to a platform trying to influence people, and actually changing the platform algorithm to surface or suppress ideas a foreign (or even domestic) state likes or doesn’t.

        Lemmy certainly doesn’t have the second type. And even american commercial social media sites don’t really do it for a specific political agenda; For them it’s only about whatever’s more profitable.