Topic: Tiktok Spying

ByteDance admits that four employees accessed the private data and IP addresses of journalists from BuzzFeed and the Financial Times to track internal leakers. This revelation coincides with the U.S. Senate voting to ban TikTok on federally owned devices due to national security concerns. The hosts argue that such surveillance is standard practice for tech companies but is being used as a pretext to protect Silicon Valley competitors.

Allegations that TikTok spied on a Forbes reporter are compared to past scandals involving American companies like HP and AT&T spying on journalists. The hosts point out the irony that Forbes is owned by a Chinese company. They argue that tech companies tracking location data to identify internal leakers is a common, albeit controversial, industry practice.