this post was submitted on 26 Jan 2026
38 points (100.0% liked)

Privacy

44952 readers
628 users here now

A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

In this community everyone is welcome to post links and discuss topics related to privacy.

Some Rules

Related communities

much thanks to @gary_host_laptop for the logo design :)

founded 6 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Question that I've been mulling over recently: My threat model dictates that I'm more likely to be surveilled by the US government than by the Chinese government. We can also assume that the Chinese government is not going to cooperate with the US government in any investigations of potential activist activity.

Would it not be best, then, to use a Chinese-made phone that, even though we know that information is going to China, we can also assume that any backdoors in the system are unknown to the US Gov?

I'm interested in everyone's take on this.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Tenderizer78@lemmy.ml 0 points 1 day ago (2 children)

China is a country that doesn't care about the individual. If it's in their interest to give your information to the Americans they will.

The best solution is really GrapheneOS.

[–] pineapple@lemmy.ml 5 points 16 hours ago (2 children)

China is a country that doesn’t care about the individual.

Literally a country dictated by it's individuals

[–] fruitycoder@sh.itjust.works 0 points 9 hours ago

Im sure the people in prison in China for trying to unionize but being denied because the state ran union decided it was again the "national" interest agree with you.

[–] Tenderizer78@lemmy.ml 1 points 15 hours ago

You have to admit that relative to America which leans more towards individual rights, China leans more towards collective rights.

[–] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 3 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

What do you mean by China not caring about the individual? Are you referring to how they center the working classes over private interests?

[–] Tenderizer78@lemmy.ml -2 points 14 hours ago (2 children)

In America the justice system leans strongly in favour of the defence (unless you're poor, but we'll put that aside for now). In China and east Asia more generally the justice system leans towards maintaining social harmony even if it means a higher risk of convicting the wrong person.

[–] HiddenLayer555@lemmy.ml 3 points 10 hours ago* (last edited 10 hours ago) (1 children)

In America the justice system leans strongly in favour of the defence (unless you’re poor, but we’ll put that aside for now)

Neat trick the tankies hate: the West is perfect if you just say that the biggest counterexample is irrelevant!

There's definitely an algorithm that decides if any arbitrary algorithm will halt or not (unless you feed its own source code back into itself, but we'll put that aside for now).

[–] Tenderizer78@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

I'm explaining the cultural difference, not judging one as better or worse. America is more individualist and China is more collectivist.

[–] Cowbee@lemmy.ml 4 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago)

This seems more like orientalism than an actual thing. The US is set up that way because it values capitalists above all else as a capitalist country, and this system puts them above the law.