Bonum Certa Men Certa

ByteDance is a National and International Threat, TikTok is Just a 'Command and Control' Front End

You would not let kids try narcotics, would you?

Fentanylware: Who's there?



Summary: TikTok, a weapon manufactured and managed by ByteDance, does much harm; we remind readers what ByteDance is really up to and cite a dozen news links about it

THERE is not enough recognition that TikTok is a dangerous weapon which deserves banning. For over a decade all the media scrutiny was directed at Twitter and GAFAM (or MAGMA, which includes LinkedIn, YouTube and Facebook after the "Meta" rebrand).



"For ByteDance, there's no need for a business model."We don't typically condone banning or "censoring" things, but in this case it's like saying that issuing a call to ban nuclear weapons is a censorious action. We intend to keep reminding readers, at least once a week, what TikTok truly is. TikTok is not social control media but a tentacle of a spying operation, ByteDance. It's controlled by China, contrary to what ByteDance tried to say some days ago [1-2] (face-saving lies), and it is doing real harm to Western societies [3] while sporting so-called "Influencers" [4-5] (euphemism for shills, which it now bankrolls to lobby for ByteDance).

For ByteDance, there's no need for a business model. It's just spying on billions of people. The Communist Party can cover the expenses. In fact, there are no sign of a commercial success (things get shut down again [6-8]), but the data stays forever. Moreover, the harm done to one's surroundings is irreversible.

TikTok divides society (see the examples published in Daily Links earlier today [9, 10]. It's by design. It also encourages the so-called "users" to vandalise and harm their surroundings... unless they are in China or in close Chinese allies (see the documentary what ByteDance internally calls "spinach" vs "opium" TikTok). It controls behaviour. It can seed discord. The "app" makes an army of "zombies". They are remotely conrrolled, in very large numbers (at scale). Consider our ongoing series about the 'Cancel Culture' Industry [1, 2, 3, 4].

"Even if the government does not ban TikTok, you really need to get TikTok out of your life and, if possible, out of the hands of loves ones."There's growing recognition in the West that TikTok harms kids' minds. It also harms their bodies (incidentally, the famous Facebook whistleblower speaks about it again; Facebook too does both). A week ago, responding to this perception criris, TikTok decided to "give parents even more control over what their teens see", but it's actually ByteDance controlling what they see.

While it's nice to see YouTube and Twitter circling down the drain (among other social control networks), let's not forget the threat which is ByteDance. Even if the government does not ban TikTok, you really need to get TikTok out of your life and, if possible, out of the hands of loves ones.

Related/contextual items from the news:



  1. 2023-06-30TikTok tries to convince users it’s keeping their data safe
  2. 2023-06-30TikTok-owner ByteDance debuts Ripple music creation app
  3. 2023-06-28 [Older] Desperation for a Viral Moment Is Driving Concerts Off the Rails
  4. 2023-06-26 [Older] Influencers Gas Up Shein After Sketchy Factory Tour: No Slave Labor Here!
  5. 2023-06-28 [Older] TikTok Bankrolls Influencers' Lawsuit Against Montana Ban
  6. 2023-06-27 [Older] TikTok Discontinues BeReal Clone, Adds Parental Filters
  7. 2023-06-27 [Older] TikTok Is Axing an In-App Feature Called TikTok Now That Mirrored BeReal
  8. 2023-06-27 [Older] TikTok is jumping off the BeReal bandwagon by killing TikTok Now

Recent Techrights' Posts

IBM is "Taking the PIP" (Piss), People 'Retire' 'Voluntarily' to "Focus on Family"
IBM has a billion bucks for 'the butcher', but not a million dollars for critical projects and initiatives in Free software
It Should be Uncontroversial to Say That Social Control Media is a Weapon
Democracy is not compatible with the likes of Kapo-Berg and MElon controlling public discourse of billions
 
Criminals Don't Obey Laws, California Does Not Enhance Online Safety
It has been a while since we last mentioned so-called 'age-verification' laws
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Saturday, August 29, 2026
IRC logs for Saturday, August 29, 2026
Links 29/08/2026: Stop the Hate, Goldfish Myths, and xmpp.nz
Links for the day
Links 29/08/2026: Wave of Social Control Media Bans, Suno Data Breach Class Actions
Links for the day
Links 29/08/2026: Microsoft GitHub Outage (Again), "Displaying Ads Directly on Your Monitor", and "Election Deniers Could Soon Control Elections"
Links for the day
Misuse of Bots (Now Sold as "Agents", "Hey Hi", "Automation", and "Efficiency")
They even try to rebrand robotics as "hey hi" and try to sell slop as "work"
Debian: Plagiarism OK, Just be "Responsible" About It
The result isn't the worst, but it's not good either
Don't Let Them Kill Activism
Are the oligarchs shutting the lid on activism and whistleblowers?
SLAPP Censorship - Part 165 Out of 200: Two Years Since My Wife and I Sued
In early September 2024 we hit back
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, August 28, 2026
IRC logs for Friday, August 28, 2026
Gemini Links 29/08/2026: Death Notice, Systems Biology, and Gopher
Links for the day
Links 28/08/2026: Chatbot Pushers Admit They're Used Heavily for Social Engineering Scams, Strong Backlash Against "Smart Glasses" (CCTV on Legs)
Links for the day
Michael Catanzaro's Latest Blog Post Affirms Rumours of Red Hat Changes and RAs/PIPs at IBM
reading between the lines, IBM is "spitting out" Red Hat staff
If Linux Was Written in Rust, 80% or More of Linux Developers Would Not Understand It (Same If It's Composed by LLM Slop)
The licence (GPL) is not enough when there are ways to bypass it
Gemini Links 28/08/2026: Absurd Tomodachi Summer, Screen Piggery, and Jugulans 1.0.3 Released
Links for the day
Links 28/08/2026: "UK Power Grid Has a Phantom Data Center Problem" and "Growth at All Costs is Cancer"
Links for the day
SLAPP Censorship - Part 164 Out of 200: Patent Troll SLAPPs, Defamation Trolls, and Stranglers From America
You start to wonder if the core issue is insecurity
Rumours of More PIPs and Layoffs at Confluent Just Months After IBM Bought It
It is meanwhile apparent IBM will have mass layoffs next week (September)
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, August 27, 2026
IRC logs for Thursday, August 27, 2026
After Many Waves of PIPs (Silent Layoffs) IBM Makes Non-Silent Layoffs, Effective Next Week (September)
What we heard is turning out to be true