ISSUE 19.28 • 2022-07-11 PUBLIC DEFENDER By Brian Livingston TikTok, the wildly popular short-video app owned by China’s ByteDance corporation, may be
[See the full post at: TikTok steals your files, passwords, and more: FCC official]
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TikTok steals your files, passwords, and more: FCC official
- This topic has 63 replies, 21 voices, and was last updated 2 years, 8 months ago.
AuthorViewing 36 reply threadsAuthor-
Assuming the news is true, TikTok is a very bad app to have on your device
So are Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Telegram..
Indeed, so are Messenger Edge Chrome,
A lot of good information about this can be found on
https://www.bitsoffreedom.nl/english/
* _ ... _ *1 user thanked author for this post.
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About tracking, tracing, fingerprinting, profiling, metadatacollecting, fishing it’s a Wild Wide Web out there, as you may know.
Edge is like Google very keen on presenting advertisements to you as they seem fit to your profile. Afterall it’s for them a businessconcept/earningconcept too.
Those two links mentioned are merely an indication where to start searching.
IT Security and Privacy specialists from/in Germany, Holland, England, Usa, Ca, Au, France, Belgium (and many others) they all present good information and advise to use applications and use the internet.
It is still incomprehensible to me that a lot of people say that they have nothing to hide, and that they don’t care at all. Even for (government) managers, this is often a far too difficult subject and too expensive to take into account. Until entire databases are stolen, then people wake up a bit.
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Seems like the perfect app for secret services all around the world? Unlimited data at their disposal!
What puzzels me is that it looks like there’s not much investigation done on such popular apps. I’m not a programmer, but it looks to me such apps are pretty easy to de-compile? And if that’s not possible, then hook up Wireshark to see what’s going in and out.
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Really disturbing. I thought Apple was screening out misbehaving apps from their store.
I’ve never used social media apps including TikTok, but it makes me wonder about other apps I am using.
Thanks Brian.
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In answer to teuhausen2 #2459616 “I thought Apple was screening out misbehaving apps from their store.”
Last year there was a long article in the June 6 issue of The Washington Post reporting that there were applications with malware in the Apple Store. There was also a thread about this in AskWoody. I have not followed the story in recent months.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/06/06/apple-app-store-scams-fraud/
I do not have anything from the Apple Store, except for a few things, such as “Garage Band”, that came with the Mac when I got it fresh from Apple, back in 2017.
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV1 user thanked author for this post.
Wondering if one way to bypass the hurdles involved in attempts to formally ban TikTok or to de-list it from app stores, might be for anti-malware vendors to flag the app and delete/quarantine it from people’s phones.
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That approach would seem not only reasonable but also necessary.
Human, who sports only naturally-occurring DNA ~ oneironaut ~ broadcaster
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especially for minors given the subject of this sickening post content
https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/tiktok-is-sued-after-girls-aged-8-and-9-hanged-themselves/
Tik-Tok’s western wildfire introduction at the start of the global pandemic, always no no (gut feeling) a global equivalent akin to GDPR would create jobs AND a safer internet.Windows - commercial by definition and now function...1 user thanked author for this post.
Then again, the “star witnesses” cited in the top one-third of this article were Trump appointees. Party Liners. Of course they’ll say “China bad!”.
The rest of the article also relies on shadowy “insider employees” and other innuendo, without anyone coming out and presenting acceptable evidence a US Court of Law would consider.
If there is evidence of specifically what traces TikTok is leaving of its alleged “spying” and data transfers to the Chinese government, I’d like at least the opportunity to see the original data dumps. And some citations of specific blocks of code found within the app which do what is claimed.
I’m sure the US tech industry and computer security experts have much more evidence than was presented in this article. I’d like at least references to some of the specific details, even if they are too technical to include in an article aimed at general-purpose readers.
Some who have posted here have included additional, more specific citations, but I still am not seeing any smoking guns here.
-- rc primak
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In reply to 2459712:
Elsewhere in the article, it says that TikTok has been banned from the armed forces, Homeland Security, and the TSA. These are all run by the Biden administration, who are not exactly devotees of a Trump party line. By now, they’ve had a year and a half to reverse any policies by the previous administration that they disliked.
Brian Livingston’s piece also quotes a Washington Post report that the current administration is “developing new regulations that are expected to rein in not only TikTok but other apps that feed data to Chinese organizations”.
And Brian also quotes an official of the Council of Foreign Relations to the effect that TikTok’s response is inadequate. You will not find a more “establishment” outfit than the CFR.
Please, let’s not turn this into a partisan issue.
Perhaps, rather than the “Daily Mail”, that is a sensationalist and tendentious yellow-press rag, these other sources might be more reliable on this topic:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/06/technology/tiktok-blackout-challenge-deaths.html
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/parents-sue-tiktok-deaths-two-girls-blackout-challenge-rcna37100
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV-
Mele20: “Care to expain that claim further?”
I would, but to do it alone, just by itself, would be off topic.
Maybe this helps?
People can find more by searching the Web with keywords such as: “Daily News” sensationalist Murdoch
Besides, that was my comment. Cybertooth is blameless.
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV -
Quora is the site to be suspicious of….not Daily Mail….besides, I never read the Science tab there. I read Home and Health tabs. But this is OT so I will not say more or reply further.
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Master Livingston, thank you for the coverage.
On the only smartphone on which I wanted to try TikTok for my media broadcast porpoises — I was never able to get TikTok into a testable condition. There were always authentication problems. Eventually I set its testing aside.
And, now that I’ve just now deleted it because of this Ask Woody thread, I wonder if the mysterious uptick in spam on my phone might be related to the virtual phone number of my biz line — which I’d provided to TikTok. There are two additional apps for which I could test hypotheses about this.
Human, who sports only naturally-occurring DNA ~ oneironaut ~ broadcaster
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If there is evidence of specifically what traces TikTok is leaving of its alleged “spying” and data transfers to the Chinese government, I’d like at least the opportunity to see the original data dumps.
There isn’t evidence just as there was never evidence found that Kaspersky software is spying for the Russian.
It’s McCarthy era yet again.Brendan Carr is a republican a President Trump nominee and was with the FCC when they Killed Net Neutrality.
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Mr.Austin , I dont’t know how serious you are about this subject, but I am.
4 links for some reading; be quick before this is blown away again.
Perhaps it’s an idea to discuss some of it?https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/12/16/1042516/the-metaverse-has-a-groping-problem/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaverse#Criticism_and_concerns
https://www.aei.org/economics/is-the-metaverse-here-to-stay-my-long-read-qa-with-mark-jamison/
regards.
* _ ... _ *1 user thanked author for this post.
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Alex: “[About alleged complicity of Kaperski with the Kremlin] It’s McCarthy era yet again.
Brendan Carr is a republican a President Trump nominee and was with the FCC when they Killed Net Neutrality.”How relevant can all this be to the alleged China espionage or to the fact that a young girl hanged herself and died, because she was playing a “blackout” game she found in TikTok?
(For that I have provided three links, in an earlier post here, to three sources with good reporting credentials.)
As to spying for China, Brian’s article quotes other sources, besides Carr, as it has ben pointed out here already by Cybertooth.
And no, this is not the return of McCarthyism’s Red Hysteria, whether or not allegations about Kapersky are true. Because this topic now under discussion is, above all, about taking a candid look at the scary ugliness of the world we have worked us humans into, all by ourselves, either by action or inaction.
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV4 users thanked author for this post.
young girl hanged herself and died
What young girls hanging themselves has to do with TikTok steals your files, passwords, and more ?
There is no shred of evidence to that just as there is no evidence for Kaspersky spying for Putin.
So yes, US McCarthyism is back legacy of Trump.And no, this is not the return of McCarthyism’s Red Hysteria, whether or not allegations about Kapersky are true. Because this topic now under discussion is, above all, about taking a candid look at the scary ugliness of the world we have worked us humans into, all by ourselves, either by action or inaction.
Just for the record,
I think Alex is right pointing out a major problem of present times: Real investigation is very rare. Journalists telling the truth are expelled or convicted, everywhere. Wars are fought for reasons that are not public, so tells the very recent history.
This so called canded-look is a peculiar way to put it. The winner writes the history, and Googles Search and Profiling Algorithms are leading the way to most people.
Society may watch out for not destroying itself, like lead was destructive for the Romanempire* _ ... _ *1 user thanked author for this post.
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Fred, We are sort of agreeing. Can we move on?
Can we go back to TikTok’s alleged misdeeds, leaving all the other ills of the world aside for just a brief moment?
I am going back there, anyway. And to bed. So: good night.
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV1 user thanked author for this post.
Rabbit hole folks, we’re getting a bit rabbit hole and thus moderation will be done accordingly.
Susan Bradley Patch Lady/Prudent patcher
3 users thanked author for this post.
I am surprised and discouraged to learn here that something potentially good as a source of innocent and amusing entertainment has developed such a nasty dark side. I wonder if there is some social network or service comparable to an ideal TikTok and what it might be like. Or if such a thing is even possible in this day and age. I appreciate Brian Livingston and others for bringing those different unsavory issues to the attention of people here concerning TikTok.
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV1 user thanked author for this post.
I am surprised and discouraged to learn here that something potentially good as a source of innocent and amusing entertainment has developed such a nasty dark side. I wonder if there is some social network or service comparable to an ideal TikTok and what it might be like. Or if such a thing is even possible in this day and age. I appreciate Brian Livingston and others for bringing those different unsavory issues to the attention of people here concerning TikTok.
quote: “something potentially good as a source of innocent and amusing entertainment”
….. Is it really?Another perspective from the guys who own and made these apps;
https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/steve-jobs-apple-ipad-children-technology-birthday-a6893216.html
* _ ... _ *1 user thanked author for this post.
Really disturbing. I thought Apple was screening out misbehaving apps from their store.
TikTok is a legitimate app until proven otherwise.
The legitimacy of TikTok has been very seriously questioned in this thread. Also: Apple might be removing unsafe “apps”, but has not been doing a great job of it, according to the Washington Post. Links to articles in support of these statements, all by reputable sources, can be found in previous comments. And, of course there is also Brian Livingston’s Newsletter article on TikTok’s ill-doings that got this thread going. Please, if interested, read them.
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV4 users thanked author for this post.
Really disturbing. I thought Apple was screening out misbehaving apps from their store.
TikTok is a legitimate app until proven otherwise.
Chinese spying via seemingly innocuous products has been going on since at least 2008: see here and here.
IMO the proper approach to take regarding TikTok is a seriously skeptical eye. Perhaps not quite “guilty until proven innocent,” but something close to it.
And yes, a generally jaundiced view of all digital products from whatever country is a prudent policy. There is no reason to privilege TikTok as “legitimate until proven otherwise” when we are security-conscious about so much else that’s available on the Internet.
IMO the proper approach to take regarding TikTok is a seriously skeptical eye. Perhaps not quite “guilty until proven innocent,” but something close to it. And yes, a generally jaundiced view of all digital products from whatever country is a prudent policy. There is no reason to privilege TikTok as “legitimate until proven otherwise” when we are security-conscious about so much else that’s available on the Internet.
I agree that “equal opportunity” skepticism for all things digital is appropriate.
And on a somewhat, but hardware related tangent, consider the Huawei cybersecurity concerns that Huawei’s infrastructure equipment may enable surveillance by the Chinese government. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huawei
Windows 10 Pro 22H2
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I have been vaguely aware of the Huawei controversy, knew that part of it was that there was a pending request to Canada for the extradition to the USA of a woman now there, a Chinese citizen, accused to be involved in alleged Huwaei’s shady practices in the USA and possibly also there.
Basically, I was not more aware because I am not in the least interested, and certainly not itching to get my hands on 5G anything.
But when reading the Wikipedia article linked just above this reply by JohnW, my mind just blew up and now I am having trouble stuffing it back inside my cranium, where it usually belongs.
Much as it is the case with TikTok, here under discussion, this is yet another sign of the corruption of the utopian dream, back in the mid to late 1990s, that the Internet was going to be, in all places, at all times and for everyone, along with other useful or entertaining things, first and foremost a freely accessible source of the truth all citizens everywhere have the responsibility and the unbridgeable right to know, as well as an open forum for freely debating the important issues of the day.
We can and should do better, no just for ourselves, but for future generations. Minding what our legacy to them will be.
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV1 user thanked author for this post.
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But when reading the Wikipedia article linked just above this reply by JohnW, my mind just blew up and now I am having trouble stuffing it back inside my cranium, where it usually belongs.
Sorry about that!
But without passing any judgement of my own, it appears that governments have attempted to “militarize” technology as fits their needs. Skepticism IMO is justified!
In any case I don’t even exclude my own (US) government. I am not intending to scapegoat any particular government, or raise “political” discussion here. Sadly, it just seems that the former technical “utopian” dream is barely visible in the rear view mirror these days… sigh…
Windows 10 Pro 22H2
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JohnW: “But without passing any judgement of my own, it appears that governments have attempted to “militarize” technology as fits their needs. Skepticism IMO is justified!”
And technology has more than once said to those governments “glad to oblige; what else can we do for you?”
Huawey has been worth noticing here because of it being suspect of secretly spying and helping steal industrial secrets for the benefit of a dictatorial regime, and, or the interest of influential parties in deploying its services, or having them deployed. TikTok, because of its alleged insidiousness as a sort of “panopticon” espionage tool targeted at its users and also a possible legal responsibility for those girls deaths. But do our own governments also do some of this kind of thing: spying, hacking, perhaps some rogue agencies even stealing? Or some plausibly deniable “Black Wings” even …?
As the old sarcastic rhetorical question goes: “Is the Pope Catholic?” We are now in the Age of Cyberwarfare. Its weapons are made mainly of code and Internet access and social engineering. They are both defensive and offensive. One may accept this fact and go from there, or live in denial and go nowhere.
While the old splendid dream of the Internet as a force for political enlightenment and a greater degree of personal freedom with better informed individuals and populace, is in the rear mirror, where things are never closer than they look.
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV1 user thanked author for this post.
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“Sticks and stones can’t hurt you” was never true and less true now.
🍻
Just because you don't know where you are going doesn't mean any road will get you there.1 user thanked author for this post.
“Sticks and stones can’t hurt you” was never true and less true now.
I thought it was “sticks and stones can break your bones but names can never hurt you”. But names can, as I think you were trying to say.
Eliminate spare time: start programming PowerShell
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Quote from the Malwarebytes-blogs
“TikTok is “unacceptable security risk” and should be removed from app stores, says FCC”[Moderator edit] trimmed URL
* _ ... _ *Quote from the Malwarebytes-blogs
“TikTok is “unacceptable security risk” and should be removed from app stores, says FCC”[Moderator edit] trimmed URL
Vulnerability in TikTok Android app could lead to one-click account hijacking https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/08/31/vulnerability-in-tiktok-android-app-could-lead-to-one-click-account-hijacking/
* _ ... _ *1 user thanked author for this post.
In my opinion, this is the biggest problem with TikTok:
Boy, 14, dies after doing same viral TikTok challenge as Archie Battersbee
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