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With the U.S. authorities’s TikTok ban set to kick in on Sunday, Americans have been flocking to another social media platform, nevertheless it’s one other Chinese app, and specialists say it may current the identical, if not much more points. There’s been a surge in U.S. downloads of the Chinese-owned software Xiaohongshu, or “RedNote” as many customers name it.  

A U.S. official informed CBS News on Thursday that RedNote, similar to TikTok, may face an ultimatum to divest, or be banned.

“This seems to be the sort of app that the statute would apply to and will face the identical restrictions as TikTok if it isn’t divested,” a U.S. official informed CBS News. 

CBS News has reached out to Xiaohongshu for remark as as to whether the corporate would agree with that evaluation. 

What is RedNote?

Xiaohongshu has been essentially the most downloaded free app on Apple’s app retailer within the U.S. since Tuesday. Analysis by Sensor Tower, a market intelligence agency, confirmed the platform’s downloads within the U.S. had elevated 200% year-on-year and seen a 194% uptick since final week. 

QR Code Generator, a agency that gives statistics on traits on-line, stated there had been a 4,900% enhance in searches on Google for Xiaohongshu within the U.S. on Monday alone.

Xiaohongshu was based in 2013 and is a life-style platform “the place over 300 million customers each month share their life experiences,” based on an outline on Apple’s app retailer. 

The Chinese photograph and video-sharing platform has usually been in comparison with Instagram. It operates as a platform for e-commerce, a guide for tips about journey and effective eating, in addition to a car for customers to share content material from their on a regular basis lives. 

Xiaohongshu actually interprets from Mandarin to “little crimson guide,” possible a reference to the famed little crimson guide of quotations from Chairman Mao Zedong, the founding father of Communist China. 

That reference has not postpone the numerous American customers who’ve turned to the app to share their experiences as so-called “TikTok refugees” forward of the U.S. ban. Videos together with a use of the “TikTok refugee” time period on RedNote have racked up hundreds of thousands of views and impressions this week.

“This is for my fellow TikTok refugees and Americans, behave on this app! You higher behave as a result of everybody in China is being so sort to us as we colonize their cutesy tootsy app simply because our authorities sucks,” one American consumer account utilizing the title “Savannah” posted on Wednesday. The submit had gained virtually 128,000 impressions by Thursday.

TikTok, in its worldwide type, isn’t out there to customers in mainland China, that means the U.S. exodus to Xiaohongshu has put Americans in nearer contact with Chinese customers than they ever had been earlier than. It’s led to some amusing cultural exchanges. 

One American “TikTok refugee” with the username “anieladiaz” posted a video asking Chinese customers if that they had any questions. A Chinese consumer commented below the submit with a screenshot of what gave the impression to be their English homework. Anieladiaz was completely happy to offer the solutions to the check questions, which they shared in their very own screenshot. Other Chinese customers have been posting movies by which they educate Americans to make use of Mandarin slang phrases. 

Is RedNote secure?

The fast rise in U.S. downloads could also be trigger for concern for a similar U.S. lawmakers who ushered within the ban on TikTok. One cybersecurity skilled informed CBS News that RedNote may very well characterize a fair better risk. 

“RedNote was by no means meant for out of doors of the China market. All of the information sharing and all of the servers to which the information is being shared is in China,” Adrianus Warmenhoven, a cybersecurity skilled at Nord VPN, informed CBS News on Wednesday. “It means they’re exempt from all of those knowledge protections and outdoors of the view of the American authorities.”

Warmenhoven stated TikTok and its father or mother firm ByteDance had at the least saved knowledge in U.S.-based servers, which gave the U.S. authorities “some modicum of moderation or limitations on knowledge that may be despatched to China and the way a lot and in what manner.”

He additionally stated RedNote’s phrases and circumstances lack transparency, which he stated presents an enormous cybersecurity threat for Americans. 

“Its phrases and circumstances are in Mandarin, leaving non-Chinese-speaking customers unclear about what knowledge is collected and the way it’s used,” Warmenhoven stated. “I’m fairly certain these hundreds of thousands who’re shifting over usually are not utilizing Google Translate to learn [the terms and conditions] so they do not know what they’re agreeing to.” 

The particular U.S. legislation used to ban TikTok — the “Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act,” which President Biden signed into regulation final April, grants the federal authorities broad scope to crack down on overseas social media platforms. 

Under the regulation, Congress can compel a platform to divest its U.S. operations from overseas possession, and it may be shut down if it qualifies as a risk. The regulation can apply to any platform that permits customers to share content material with one another and has greater than 1 million month-to-month energetic customers, is owned by an organization situated in a overseas adversary-controlled nation, and has been decided by the president to current a major nationwide safety risk.

The laws is presently topic to a authorized problem by ByteDance, which has argued that it is unconstitutional and violates the primary modification defending free speech. A ruling from the Supreme Court is pending in that case.

CBS News has requested President-elect Donald Trump’s transition group whether or not the incoming administration may deem RedNote a nationwide safety risk that needs to be topic to the regulation. The transition group had not responded by the point of the publication of this text. 

Trump has spoken out not too long ago in opposition to the TikTok ban. Last month, he stated he had a “heat spot in my coronary heart” for TikTok – a reversal from his stance when he final occupied the Oval Office. 

The Federal Trade Commission, the company tasked with implementing the ban and making certain that web service suppliers within the U.S. and app retailer firms similar to Apple and Google adjust to the regulation, declined to remark. 

RedNote is closely censored

Content on RedNote seems to be way more heavily censored than posts on TikTok. A CBS News evaluation discovered that any seek for “Xi Jinping,” China’s autocratic president, on RedNote yielded no outcomes in any way. 

The time period “Free Hong Kong” additionally introduced again no outcomes. A seek for “Taiwan” will flip up a number of memes welcoming Americans to the platform, however noting that customers should acknowledge the Beijing-imposed narrative that the democratically ruled island simply off China’s coast, which the U.S. is legally certain to assist defend from invasion, is an inseparable a part of China. 

An analogous seek for these phrases on TikTok turns up a variety of political beliefs from customers, together with posts closely important of Chinese censorship. 

RedNote even seems to be scaling up operations to observe content material given the huge variety of Americans signing onto the app. CBS News discovered local job listings posted by the corporate on-line in mainland China promoting jobs to overview English content material and promising a month-to-month wage of between $950 and $1,200.

“Users usually are not going to a spot with extra freedom. RedNote is moderated otherwise, and the algorithm is totally different from TikTok,” Warmenhoven informed CBS News. “You is not going to get traction or it is not going to unfold politically delicate points, or possibly social delicate points — particularly points which can be socially delicate in China.”