Despite evidence of Chinese government-tied TikTok’s national security risks, WIRED just published a piece falsely framing Americans’ concerns as racist.
WIRED contributor Yangyang Cheng’s August 9 piece, “The All-American Myth of the TikTok Spy,” defended Chinese-owned “spyware” TikTok while largely ignoring damning evidence of the app’s national security risks. Cheng cited examples of anti-Chinese prejudice from Westerners in the past to pretend that major security concerns about Chinese Communist Party (CCP) infiltration in the U.S., including through TikTok, are part of a continuum of “white fragility” and prejudice. “The tone is reminiscent of an earlier era, when the United States claimed the holy mantle to save the colored masses of the world from the red menace.”
Ultimately, in her propaganda-laced WIRED piece, Cheng alleged that “the panic over Chinese espionage is inseparable from the apprehension about the West in decline…China is used as a foil to project American fears and desires.” Whistleblower testimony and other terrifying evidence demonstrates a clear risk from the Beijing-tied TikTok, including the CCP’s sinister access to user data.
While Cheng did admit some potential issues with TikTok, she foolishly attempted to make it seem equivalent to admittedly intrusive U.S. technologies like Amazon’s Alexa. “‘Everyone is being surveilled constantly, but it’s always ‘Shoot the balloon!’ and never ‘Unplug Alexa,’” Cheng wrote, quoting comedian Bowen Yang, mocking U.S. worries over the recent Chinese spy balloon scandal. According to Cheng, calling out TikTok’s spyware capabilities is exaggerative and prejudiced.
The WIRED piece seemed to paint a picture of supposed congressional harassment of TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew during a previous hearing. “For the next five and a half hours, Chew, who is Singaporean of Chinese descent, tried valiantly to distance his employer as well as himself from ties to China,” Cheng wrote. “Chew’s responses, packaged in notably Americanized English, did little to assuage skeptics on the committee. Many lawmakers believe the short-video app is a weapon in disguise.”
Cheng specifically tried to frame Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA) as prejudiced, because the congresswoman reportedly and previously blocked efforts to replace the word “Oriental” with “Asian.” Cheng then cited Rep. Rodgers’ remark, ‘‘We do not trust that TikTok will ever embrace American values.’”
Of course, Cheng whipping out the race card is an absurd attempt to gloss over the fact that the CCP itself owns a board seat and a financial stake in TikTok’s parent ByteDance.
TikTok agreed to store data “exclusively on US-based servers run by Oracle,” Cheng explained. “The software giant, proudly American, boasts” U.S. government clients. What Cheng didn’t address was the evidence that employees of ByteDance and even CCP members can reportedly access TikTok’s data directly. All companies in China are bound by “civil-military fusion,” where everything in the economic and tech spheres is accessible to the Chinese military.
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