WeChat confirms that it makes all private user data available to the Chinese government

WeChat confirms that it makes all private user data available to the Chinese government

http://www.moneycontrol.com/news/bu...ilable-to-the-chinese-government-2391847.html

 

Unlike in Western countries, companies over there don't have much choices, they have to "obey" or get "problems"...

 

True but Tencent is not a company just obeying, they are actively helping the surveillance state:
https://boingboing.net/2015/10/06/reputation-economy-dystopia-c.html

 

Are you aware of the provisions of the UK's Investigatory Powers Act? Similarly, NSLs.

Companies can be compelled to insert backdoors or presumably hand over certificates so they are wide open. And they are gagged.

It's true that the companies are less inclined to hand over everything, but that's mainly because THEY want to do the mining, and in fact are being co-opted by the western government to do the screening on behalf of the government, a kind of privatised police. It's very handy for governments involved because they can be absolved of the responsibility and lack of constitutionality, hiding behind the commercial-in-confidence and rapacious-Tos.

That the Chinese scenario is worse doesn't actually make the situation acceptable in the west (and it's almost certainly going to be found illegal in the EU at any rate).

 

At least the Chinese tell the truth about it. Ours just lie.

 

Do you think the conflict of interest between the EU's new data protection laws and the British investigatory powers act had anything to do with brexit?

 

No. I think the IPA is already certainly illegal under the HRA and would be so regardless of ECJ or UK Supreme Court. You don't need GPDR for that, nor Brexit - but the UK has committed to it - go figure.... Sadly, most people are unaware or complacent about what the IPA covers. But then of course, they've got nothing to hide.

The provision for unilaterally compelling companies to do what they want would not fall under HRA though, probably would the GPDR, as well as being a spectacularly foolish own-goal. I've already read reports of UK software companies moving software development abroad for this reason. Non-UK companies are far more likely to tell them where to get off, or simply stop operating in the UK.

 

Chinese Authorities Accidentally Admit to Accessing Deleted WeChat Messages

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/ne...y-admit-to-accessing-deleted-wechat-messages/

 

This Week In China Tech: WeChat Offers Users Their DNA, Baidu Identifies Tumors, And More

https://www.forbes.com/sites/baymcl...rs-their-dna-baidu-identifies-tumors-and-more

 

Citizen Lab: WeChat’s real-time censorship system uses hash indexes to filter content

https://www.zdnet.com/article/citiz...p-system-uses-hash-indexes-to-filter-content/

 

We Chat, They Watch: How International Users Unwittingly Build up WeChat’s Chinese Censorship Apparatus - The Citizen Lab