Irish Examiner view: More than just spy balloons

Chinese technology

Tiktok is a Chinese company popular young audience worldwide. Picture: AP Photo/File

It has been a challenging few days for technology coming out of China. The Middle Kingdom’s growing power is becoming manifest in many ways, but there seems to be an increasing distrust of its tech.

The US recently shot down a Chinese balloon off the South Carolina coast, believing it to be carrying out surveillance of its territory; the US State Department has since warned that China has balloons carrying out similar surveillance missions over five continents.

Australia has also been proactive with Chinese imports. This week its federal government committed to removing security cameras at government buildings across the country, believing they are an inherent security risk; they are products of Chinese companies Hikvision and Dahua, and politicians in Australia have expressed concern about the data being collected — “and where it would end up”, as one of them has said.

On one hand, this is part of an ongoing geopolitical dance — US president Joe Biden was careful to say the balloon incident had not damaged his country’s relationship with China, for instance, but destroying it was clearly intended as a message to the Chinese authorities.

However, when it comes to gathering data, the horse may have already bolted. Millions of people all over the world have no problem storing their data and information on a variety of social media platforms, though the likes of Instagram and Facebook have been fined vast sums for data breaches of various kinds.

Another social media giant was in the dock just a couple of weeks ago in France when Tiktok was fined €5m for manipulating users’ consent through its cookie options.

Tiktok is a Chinese company, of course, and hugely popular with young users. 

Deeply embedded in our society, it has already gathered far more information than balloons or security cameras ever could.