Summary
Many Americans are migrating to RedNote, a Chinese-owned app based in China, raising significant privacy and security concerns.
Experts warn that RedNote, based in China, is subject to Chinese laws, including the Personal Information Protection Law and Data Security Law, which grant the government rights to request data and cooperation with intelligence operations.
Enforcement of these laws is often opaque. Analysts highlight risks of data collection, algorithm manipulation, and censorship on RedNote.
Critics argue the U.S. lacks comprehensive privacy laws, driving users to platforms like RedNote that may pose even greater risks than TikTok.
there’s genuinely been some class consciousness getting into play
i saw some users from both countries compare prices of eggs and vegetables, and they even did the necessary math of accounting for average wage and cost of living. the chinese users are not allowed to talk about their politics (sadly; this is a bad thing) but they are allowed to talk about foreign politics and they are probably bigger fans of Luigi Mangione even than i have seen in English speaking social media. there are candid discussions of queerphobia as well in its different social (and for the US, political too) manifestations between countries.
The funny thing is at any point the US government can ban the collection of personal user data. It could just be illegal for any company to do this in the US.
But like you said, it’s just about the US wanting to spy on its own citizens but not wanting other countries to.
“it’s okay when we do it” —the US on literally everything it criticizes in other nations