US FTC Seeks Data on How Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, and Others Use Personal Data

Australia Brings in WTO Umpire to Resolve China’s Trade Sanctions

The Australian government is officially taking the Chinese regime to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) over its imposition of duties on barley after several months of Beijing refusing to engage in a dialogue to sort it out. Federal Trade Minister Simon Birmingham said in a media release on Dec. 16 that Australia “stands ready” to defend the interests of its barley producers and all exporters. “Whilst Australia respects China’s right, as with any nation, to undertake domestic investigations into anti-dumping matters, we do not agree with China’s decision to impose anti-dumping and countervailing duties on Australian barley,” Birmingham said. “Australia’s decision to take this step is consistent with our previous use of WTO processes. We have continued to raise our concerns with China on numerous occasions, both bilaterally and through the relevant…

WASHINGTON—The Federal Trade Commission is seeking information from Facebook, Twitter, and other social media and video streaming companies about how they use the personal information that they collect on their users, the U.S. agency said on Dec. 14.

In addition to Facebook Inc. and Twitter Inc., the orders requesting data were sent to Facebook subsidiary WhatsApp, Amazon.com Inc., China’s ByteDance unit TikTok, Discord Inc., Reddit Inc., Snap Inc., and Google subsidiary YouTube LLC.

The FTC is seeking to learn how the companies collect data on users, how they decide which advertisements to show and how algorithms are used, among other information, the agency said in a statement. It’s also seeking information about how the companies’ practices affect children and teenagers.

The companies have 45 days to respond to the orders, which are usually used to generate policy or recommend legislation.

In a joint statement, two Democratic members of the commission, Rohit Chopra and Rebecca Slaughter, and one Republican, Christine Wilson, noted their impetus for the order.

“Never before has there been an industry capable of surveilling and monetizing so much of our personal lives,” they wrote. “Social media and video streaming companies now follow users everywhere through apps on their always-present mobile devices. This constant access allows these firms to monitor where users go, the people with whom they interact, and what they are doing. … Too much about the industry remains dangerously opaque.”

Discord said it looked forward to answering the FTC’s questions. “We make no money from advertising, selling user data to advertisers, or sharing users’ personal information with others. Instead, the company generates its revenue directly from users through a paid subscription service,” a spokesperson said in an email statement.

None of the other companies immediately responded to a request for comment.

By Diane Bartz

Focus News: US FTC Seeks Data on How Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, and Others Use Personal Data

Australian PM Wants Mature Dialogue as CCP Accuses Canberra of Playing the ‘Victim’

A spokesperson for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has accused Australia of playing the victim in response to the regime’s coercive trade strikes on Australian exports. This comes as the spokesperson, Wang Wenbin, justified its trade embargoes but denied knowledge of an alleged ban on Australian coal. Prime Minister Scott Morrison told The Morning Show聽on Wednesday that the Chinese regime had not confirmed to the government about any official decision it has made. He also pointed out that while Australia takes these issues very seriously, Australia’s biggest coal export markets are actually Japan and India. South Korea is another. “If there were such a ban on coal, then that would be in direct contravention to the World Trade Organisation [WTO] rules. It would also be a complete breach of the…