The same tools built to manipulate people into buying things, are used to manipulate them into thinking and acting in ways that could be beneficial to someone. Advertising and propaganda use the same tactics, after all. When these tools are accessible to anyone, including political adversaries, it would be naive to think that they're not being used for information warfare.

The Cambridge Analytica leak was just the tip of the iceberg. These companies and agencies are still operating at a global scale, and business is booming. Why adtech companies weren't heavily investigated and regulated after this became public is beyond me. These are matters of national security, which anyone sane would consider more important than any financial or practical value they might have.

Banning TikTok was a step in the right direction, but that's far from the only service that needs to be heavily regulated. And even that decision is flip-flopped and very controversial, so the idea of going beyond must be unthinkable. Yet not doing so will lead to the eventual downfall of the US, and the current western hegemony. The instability we're seeing now is just the beginning, and my only hope is that it doesn't escalate to a major global conflict.

But then, “Meta considered doing business in China, evaluated and negotiated with the Chinese government what would be required to do so, and then did not proceed” isn’t a story that is going to sell a lot of books or get her a lot of attention.

Another tell that this is a stunt for attention and not a genuine issue is her trying to blame China’s progress in AI on Meta’s release of an open-source model.

Unless Congress asks for the testimony, which is probably why Meta tried to stop the hearing.

Has Hawley demonstrated similar interest about Elon's business dealings in China? Elon owes much of his net worth to the CCP's Shanghai factory.

I appreciate the information coming out, but in some of these situations I can't help but picture that "the worst person in the room" in regards to the offenses might also end up being the person that then becomes the most holier than thou when they get out of the company.

If you ever met someone who used to work in software ads and ask them about privacy you'll get what I mean.

Then show those documents? It's hard to take these allegations seriously when the mysterious proof is only alluded to, not submitted as part of the testimony.

Now that the Chinese economy has become so important in the world, the ideological aspects are seeping into the economies of all countries, though it doesn't translate well into western politics. I think this is because the western political system was a limited-trust system, it only worked well when the state was anemic; if the state becomes big (cash-rich), companies will find that they can start to earn significant sums of money from the state, they will redirect their attention to catering to the needs of the state and away from the private sector. Unfortunately the western state has no intrinsic ideology, no intrinsic needs or goals, so it will lead to corruption or faux-adoption of external ideologies (as a means to serve private financial interests).

Western governments cannot form genuine ideological movements (besides the ideology of economic pragmatism) IMO because their foundations aren't designed to support anything besides that. They are founded on the principles of individualism and limited state power.

This is phrasing is very weaselly. All foreign companies in China either partner with or are operated by a domestic company like Alibaba or Tencent. Saying "we don't operate our services in China" is like saying water is wet to people who know what that really means. It doesn't in anyway invalidate the claims made against them.