Articles by: "Fergus Ryan"
Why TikTok isn’t really a social media app

There’s one thing we’re all getting wrong about TikTok: it’s not really a social media app. As TikTok Australia’s general manager told the Senate Select Committee on Foreign Interference through Social Media in September last …

The clock’s ticking for regulators on TikTok

In the 18 months the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission was busily working away on its 623-page opus on digital platforms, Chinese-owned app upstart TikTok grew a global audience of over 700 million. With no …

A roadmap for reining in big tech

Anyone watching Mark Zuckerberg’s testimony to Congress in April following the Cambridge Analytica scandal would be forgiven for thinking US politicians shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near tech policy. The questions the mostly grey-haired representatives fielded …

ASPI suggests

  The world This week, the summit between Donald Trump and Kim Jong‑un overwhelmingly captured the world’s attention. The two leaders signed a joint statement, President Trump followed with a lengthy press conference and The …

Walking the walk on values with China

In the three months’ worth of data I collected from the top 10 foreign embassies in China—measured by follower numbers for my just-released report Weibo diplomacy and censorship in China—the Australian embassy’s account was censored just …

Breaking the Australia–China media feedback loop

Julie Bishop was playing a dangerous game when she privately blamed the Australian media’s ‘negative reports’ for adversely affecting Australia–China relations during her meeting with her Chinese counterpart on the sidelines of the G20 in Argentina …

Defence says no to WeChat

The Australian Defence Department has banned staff and serving personnel from downloading the Chinese social media and messaging app WeChat onto their work phones. ASPI’s International Cyber Policy Centre staff sat down today to discuss …