July 19, 2023
CHRIS KENNY: But let's go to Melbourne now and catch up with the Shadow Home Affairs and Cyber Security Minister James Paterson. Thanks for joining us, James. You've been doing extraordinary work in Senate committees pursuing TikTok over just how much access the company gets to users in Australia, their information, even some of the TikTok operatives in China accessing that information. And it's been quite disturbing what you've been able to uncover. But now the company has failed to deliver some key documents that the Senate had asked for. Tell us what's going on there?
JAMES PATERSON: That's right, Chris. I mean, the evidence in person last week was incredible in the true sense of the word. It completely lacked credibility. And yet their answers that are finally coming in very late in writing now are not much better. So, you might remember one of the questions I asked in person that they weren't able to answer was, where is your headquarters? Well, one week later they provided an answer in writing that says they still don't know where the headquarters is. ByteDance is apparently the only company in the world that has no headquarters. But to your point, Chris, the answers were due by 5pm Friday. At 5:01 pm the secretariat of the committee received an email from TikTok saying they needed extra time. Talk about leaving your request for an extension on your homework to the very last minute. And still, as we sit here today, we do not have all of the answers that TikTok said they would be able to provide to the committee. So they're way overdue and it's not good enough. And they need to understand, as every witness before the committee needs to understand, that I expect them to provide all the answers that were
requested and to do so in a timely way. Otherwise, the matter will be have to be referred to the Senate for very serious consequences.
KENNY: Yeah, we'll wait and see what happens with those documents. But when it came to that in person questioning the sort of information you got should be very disturbing to Australians because you were demonstrating and getting them to admit that operatives in China could get all sorts of information from users in Australia and other countries, of course, including what Internet servers that they were plugging into. What were the most disturbing revelations in your mind?
PATERSON: Chris, it took me literally 49 minutes to get there, but eventually we did get some very important and significant concessions from the TikTok executives. Firstly, they admitted that Australian user data is accessible to their employees who are based in China. Second, they admitted that those employees based in China can make remote changes to the algorithm. That is what you or I see on the app. Then they admitted that those employees based in China were subject to China's intelligence and security laws, which compels them to cooperate with China's intelligence agencies and to keep that cooperation secret. But despite those concessions, they expected us to also believe that those employees and the company would refuse to cooperate, that is, they would break Chinese law in China in order to protect our data. Now, that last point is utterly unbelievable. We have seen before Chinese business leaders who think they are not subject to the whims of the Chinese Communist Party and it doesn't end very well for them.
KENNY: Indeed, that is one of those bits of the evidence that, as you say, is literally incredible. Now, I notice in the UK at the moment, public surveys have said that the public would support the complete banning of TikTok. We obviously banned it for political and public service people in this country. Do we need to go further? Is TikTok a risk to national security in anybody's hands?
PATERSON: Well, this is yet more evidence of the public being a long way ahead of governments on this issue. While the public is incredibly sceptical about these applications and their programs, the government is out there allowing them in many instances to be on government devices or in the case of some of the CCTV cameras or drones I’ve exposed being operated by sensitive government departments. And it is time that government caught up with public sentiment on these issues. It took a long time for the Albanese government to finally agree to ban TikTok from government devices, but only after months of campaigning and only the after all our allies and friends did so. My view is we have to keep that option on the table for the six to seven million Australians who use the app, because if we don't then TikTok won't take us seriously and won't cooperate on any other issues. So, they must understand that that threat is real if we are to ever deal with the other issues posed by the app.
KENNY: Just quickly, James, as a Victorian Senator, I want to get your thoughts on the Commonwealth Games issue. I know that's going to be pursued by Bridget McKenzie in
Senate committees as well. What are the key bits of information that Victorians and Australians deserve to know about this?
PATERSON: Well, frankly, as a Victorian, I'm embarrassed, Chris. I think my home state is approaching the status of a failed state. The Andrews government has already had to cancel major infrastructure projects like regional fast rail, like the airport rail link, and now they've cancelled a Commonwealth Games really with very little notice and time at all and could be up for $1 billion of compensation. And my prediction, Chris, is this is not the last project that will be cancelled. It's not the last project that's running way, way, way over budget because Labor, as we know at the federal level and state level, just can't manage money and they're doing enormous harm to Victoria's economy and our international reputation. We really need to get to the bottom of these supposed costings that Daniel Andrews is using. We really need to get to the bottom of why this had to be a regional games and couldn't be delivered in Melbourne where there's existing sporting infrastructure. And when this decision was made and how long he has strung along the international Commonwealth Games movement because it appears that the Andrews government has not been upfront about this and has been cooking this up for some time.
KENNY: We sure do need those answers. Senator James Paterson, thanks for joining us.
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