by jariusbondoc | Aug 19, 2026 | Gotcha
Photo from DPWH/Facebook
President Bongbong Marcos thinks we’re all litterbugs. He asks why we can’t be like Japanese youngsters who pocket candy wrappers till they get home to put in waste bins.
Actually many of us Filipinos are neatniks. We do bring home trash for proper disposal. We segregate and compost.
But what happens after that? The government louses up garbage collection.
Observe those garbage collectors – government hirelings. They unload our trash bins onto open stinking trucks. They tear open the garbage bags and mix together what we carefully segregated: plastics, paper, cardboards. They even accept careless neighbors’ kitchen waste and rotten food which should’ve been shredded and flushed onto home septic tanks.
Worse follows thereafter. Rubbish trucks speed on highways, stench and flying scraps and all. Everything’s dumped onto open sites, bulldozed, and let to pile up dozens of feet high.
Officials never learned from the Payatas-Quezon City dump disaster of July 2000. Consecutive typhoons caused the unstable pile of trash 130 feet high – 13 building floors – to collapse, killing 300 scavengers and shanty residents, and leaving 300 more missing.
It happened again in Baguio city in Aug. 2011. The decommissioned Irisan dump collapsed onto homes along Asin Road below, killing six and destroying scores of dwellings.
And twice more this year. Jan. 8th: Cebu city’s Binaliw landfill caved in, killing 36 workers, injuring 18, and dozens missing. Feb. 20th: Rodriguez, Rizal landfill gave way, from which only one scavenger’s body was retrieved, although eyewitnesses said as many as 50 were trapped underneath tons of garbage.
Not to forget, a month-long fire raged last April in Navotas Sanitary Landfill, spreading noxious fumes in Metro Manila and Bulacan, in breach of the 1999 Clean Air Act.
On Aug. 10th-14th monsoon rains and high tide pushed 750 tons of garbage – 200 truckloads – onto Redemptorist Water Channel in Baclaran, Parañaque.
The artificial white sand beach along Manila’s famed sunset boulevard also caused floods in the capital. The dolomite sand regularly accumulates massive amounts of drifting trash, clogging up drains.
That dolomite beach is the fault of Dept. of Environment and Natural Resources. It ignored findings that dolomite dust harms the eyes, lungs, and skin. It didn’t study the environmental impact of the fake beachfront on Manila Bay. It paid a contractor P654 million to extract and pulverize dolomite rocks from seaside Alcoy, Cebu. Its Mines and Geosciences Bureau issued ore transport permits without requisite Alcoy municipal permit and public consultation.
Yet President Rody Duterte on Aug. 26th, 2021 praised the monstrosity: “Dolomite is beautiful to the eyes.”
That encapsulated the issue of floods, garbage, and environmental ruin. Politicos and bureaucrats allowed it.
Five years later last Aug. 12th BBM contrasted Filipinos with Japanese kids. National and local politicos and bureaucrats mimicked him, blaming floods and garbage on us citizens.
They must reread the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act of 2000. Salient features of that R.A. 9003:
• Purpose: Manage solid waste, prioritize waste reduction, protect public health and nature;
• Key provisions: Segregation at source, that is, households, institutions, and commercial establishments must separate garbage into biodegradable, recyclable, non-recyclable/residual and special hazardous waste; 3Rs approach or reduce, reuse, recycle; focus on minimizing waste, composting organic materials; barangays or clusters of them must build materials recovery facilities for sorting;
• Local governments tasked with direct collection, sorting, and structural execution of solid waste programs, including formulating a mandatory 10-year local waste management plan;
• National Solid Waste Management Commission to oversee programs, set guidelines, and unify local strategies;
• NSWMC to be chaired by DENR Sec. (presently Juan Miguel Cuna, with vice chairman Crispian Lao and executive director Maria Delia Valdez).
Sixteen prohibited acts, including:
• Littering, throwing waste matters (including pet poo) in public places such as roads, sidewalks, canals, esteros or parks, and establishments, or causing or permitting the same;
• Undertaking activities or operating, collecting or transporting equipment in violation of sanitation operation and other requirements or permits, P300-P1,000 fine or 1-15 days community service;
• Unsanitary collecting and trucking; open burning of solid waste; causing or permitting the collection of non-segregated or unsorted wastes; take note: city/municipal mayors and barangay officials;
• Squatting in open dumps and landfills; open dumping, burying of biodegradable or nonbiodegradable materials in flood prone areas, P1,000-P3,000 or one-half to six months imprisonment;
• Mixing of source-separated recyclable materials with other solid waste in any vehicle, box, container or receptacle used in solid waste collection; improper operation of open dumps; manufacture, distribution, or use of non-environmentally acceptable packaging materials, P500,000;
• Importing toxic wastes misrepresented as “recyclable” or “with recyclable content”, P10,000-P200,000, plus imprisonment of 30 days to three years;
• Constructing any establishment within 200 meters from open dumps, controlled dumps, or sanitary landfill; and constructing or operating landfills or any waste disposal facility on any aquifer, groundwater reservoir, or watershed area and or any portions thereof, P100,000-P1 million, plus one to six years in prison.
In Dec. 2008 the Supreme Court ordered national and local officials to keep Manila Bay clean. The 1977 Environment Code or PD 1152 obligates them to do so.
Covered agencies: DENR, DILG, PNP Maritime Group, Coast Guard, DBM, DepEd, DOH, DA, DPWH, MWSS, LWUA, PPA, MMDA.
Local governments: Bataan, Pampanga, Bulacan, Tarlac, Cavite, Laguna, Rizal, and 17 Metro Manila cities.
Officials, politicos, and bureaucrats must also beware. We Filipinos want them to answer for the P1.7-trillion flood control scam, 2016-present, which killed family members and destroyed our homes, farms, orchards, shops, vehicles, furniture, clothes, even memorabilia.
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by jariusbondoc | Aug 14, 2026 | Gotcha
Photo from DPWH/Facebook
Senate Minority Leader Alan Cayetano is being blamed for 32 ghost public works. He is also being blamed for the dormancy of 32 Senate committees.
The two issues are joined.
The 32 fake flood works are in Cayetano’s Taguig home city. All are labeled “slope protection and mitigation”, Majority Senator Panfilo Lacson said. Some are for around P100 million each, totaling P2.385 billion from Cayetano’s P6.79-billion insertion in the 2025 national budget.
“Bulacan is the microcosm of flood project anomalies. Taguig is something else – employing old and new tricks, passing off illegal reclamations as slope protection, ghost projects, double appropriations, recycled photos from past completed contracts to bill and collect for new ones – all controlled by one person, dating as far back as 2019,” Lacson posted on X.
Cayetano took offense, saying that phantom works worsened floods in Bulacan, while there’s none in Taguig.
Lacson alleged plunder, malversation, graft and corruption. “We turned over to the Office of the Ombudsman for their further evaluation and motu proprio investigation all documentary and testimonial evidence, official records from government websites, while others were supplied by reliable sources. From 2020-2025 Taguig accumulated P14.4B worth of infra projects and still counting.”
Among the contracts are P94-million flood control in Barangay Lower Bicutan, P49.9-million multipurpose building at the Lakeshore Complex reclamation, P94-million Laguna Lakeshore improvement, and two rehab works each worth P141.8 million at Phases 4 and 5.
Lacson avoided linking Cayetano’s wife Laarni who is on her fifth term as Taguig mayor, 2025-2028. She was four-time mayor in 2010-2019 and 2022-2025.
Cayetano’s estranged brother Lino tipped off Lacson about other details. Lino was Taguig congressman in 2013-2016 and mayor in 2019-2022. He now chairs government-owned People’s Television Network.
Taguig proceeded with reclamation on its own and sold segments to private buyers without Philippine Reclamation Authority consent. PRA is to seize large portions of the Laguna de Bay reclamation, Lacson told DZBB Sunday.
Last Tuesday, Cayetano did not attend the Senate impeachment hearing in the morning and plenary in the afternoon.
Majority Senator Raffy Tulfo complained about inability to convene three committees that he chairs – Environment, Migrant Workers, Public Services. He said that’s because Cayetano refuses to nominate Minority senators as members.
Angry words were exchanged with Alan’s sister Minority Senator Pia Cayetano. She said Tulfo should have approached her to inquire about the committee memberships instead of resorting to dramatics. She added that Alan wasn’t there because feeling under the weather.
The previous day Alan had said on a Facebook video that he showered in the cold rain Sunday. Though absent from the Senate on Tuesday he broadcast from home on Facebook about “purpose in politics and in faith”.
Senate President Sherwin Gatchalian confirmed that 32 of 41 standing committees have been sleeping because of no members from the Minority.
Among these committees are the powerful Blue Ribbon which investigates graft and corruption, and Foreign Affairs which is the sole purview of the Senate.
Also Education, Health, Science and Technology, Public Works, Defense, Agriculture, and Transportation which are to receive bulk of the 2027 national budget.
Committee hearings scrutinize budget details before submission to the plenary.
As far back as June 3rd Raffy’s brother Majority Senator Erwin Tulfo complained that he too couldn’t convene the Blue Ribbon Committee that he chairs. Cayetano allegedly was delaying to nominate four Minority senators as members. Yet the Minority was heckling Tulfo for supposed refusal to continue investigating the P1.7-trillion flood works scandal.
On July 29th Lacson posted on X: “The public may partake of the ‘delicious’ part if they watch the Blue Ribbon Committee hearings – details of the truth behind the 5 Taguig case studies we submitted to the Ombudsman.”
Yet the previous day Erwin accused the Minority of attempting to prevent the Blue Ribbon from proceeding with the probe.
Asked who from the Minority was seeking to stop the hearing, Erwin avoided naming names but said, “Obvious. Who is being investigated? Who is Senator Lacson targeting?”
Cayetano was Senate President from May 11th to June 3rd – 23 working days. For five days thereafter he boycotted the plenary while broadcasting daily on Facebook to forestall his ouster.
Cayetano reappeared at the Senate with unkempt beard and mustache.
On July 20th Erwin told podcaster Christian Esguerra: “I think he started this actuation nu’ng matanggal siya as Senate President. Nag-iba ang takbo ng isip ni Senator Alan. Kaya nga ipinagdadasal ko na lang na sana bumalik pa sa katinuan.
“Tignan mo pati ang postura niya. Hindi na nag-aahit. Hindi mo na maintindihan. Parang taong-grasa na. ‘Yong porma niya, pati ‘yong mga pananalita niya, parang out of the blue biglang mag-snap na lang ng ganun.”
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by jariusbondoc | Aug 12, 2026 | Gotcha
PNA Photo
“Is there such crime as character assassination – or even ‘attempted’ character assassination?”
That’s Atty. Ruy Rondain’s reply when asked about a purported plot by his law firm to do a hatchet job on Executive Secretary Ralph Recto.
Rondain told this writer yesterday he is one of four lawyers linked by the NBI to the plot. He said he and partner Atty. Orlando Mendiola have been subpoenaed to the NBI-National Capital Region on Friday.
Rondain declined to identify his two junior associates implicated by the NBI: “Kawawa naman sila, mga bata pa, hindi pa sanay sa ganito.”
“In deference to the NBI” he also would not say what statement to give to investigators. “I will just talk to news reporters afterwards.”
In headlines is news about Batangas Rep. Leandro Leviste’s supposed scheme to smear the reputation of political archfoe Executive Secretary Ralph Recto.
It started with the arrest on July 28th by NBI agents of a pimp and five trafficked women in an elite Manila hotel. During investigation the pimp alias “Ken” and one of the women alias “Jen” asked if their arrest had to do with their planned smear job.
NBI Director Melvin Matibag then told the press about the plan of “Ken”, “Jen”, and three of the four arrestees to execute affidavits linking Recto to drugs and illicit trysts in a Makati condo from 2022 to 2025.
Matibag said ex-congressman Jacinto “Jing” Paras met with “Ken” and “Jen” thrice – July 11th, 15th, 26th – to polish the tale.
Paras supposedly told “Ken” and “Jen” that Leviste will pay them P5 million – P1 million each for “Ken”, “Jen”, and the three other women. Another P500,000 is supposedly Paras’s commission, Matibag told Sapol-DWIZ Saturday.
Matibag said four lawyers were present in the July 15th and 26th meetings. In a sworn statement on Aug. 6th “Ken” identified the four lawyers through photographs.
“Ken” swore that the two junior associates brought laptops to take the false testimonies.
The smear job was supposed to have come in series, starting Aug. 2nd or 3rd, Matibag quoted “Ken” and “Jen”.
Matibag said one of the charges against Leviste, Paras, and the four lawyers could be subornation of perjury.
Subornation of perjury is the criminal act of persuading, inducing, or forcing another person to lie under oath. It can be through bribery or coercion.
But to carry weight, subornation of perjury must have been consummated via an actual false testimony.
Leviste and Paras have denied NBI’s allegations. Through their respective lawyers, Karen Danielle Fajardo and Mark Tolentino, they have also asked for specific charges before showing up at NBI-NCR yesterday, Tuesday.
The NBI announced, however, that Leviste flew to Hong Kong Aug. 2nd with no given return date.
Rondain said his associate Fajardo and his lawyer-daughter Gabrielle appeared at the NBI on Leviste’s behalf. He said Leviste engaged their services only this week.
Rondain and Mendiola have prominent – controversial – political clients. Foremost is ex-congressman Zaldy Co, reportedly hiding in Europe from criminal charges related to the P1.7-trillion flood control scam. Also from supposed death threats, since he linked President Bongbong Marcos, son Rep. Sandro Marcos, and ex-Speaker Martin Romualdez to the flood works scandal.
Rondain was also counsel in 2021 of then-Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi in the latter’s controversial transfer of $565-million Chevron shares in Malampaya gas field to then-President Rody Duterte’s campaign contributor Dennis Uy.
Rondain was also counsel in 2006 of then-First Gentleman Mike Arroyo whom 36 journalists sued for P12.5-million damages.
Reports are that Leviste and Paras are targeting five other prominent officials for character assassination: Ombudsman Jesus Crispin Remulla, DILG Sec. Jonvic Remulla, DPWH Sec. Vince Dizon, DICT Sec. Henry Aguda, and Secretary to the Cabinet Benhur Abalos.
Paras and the Remulla brothers are members of the UP-Diliman fraternity Upsilon Sigma Phi. They joined in 1971, 1979, and 1987, respectively.
Paras’s lawyer is Atty. Mark Tolentino. A Lex Talionis frat brother of Duterte in San Beda Law, Tolentino was Assistant Secretary of Transportation in 2017. Paras and Tolentino could not be reached for comment.
Tolentino was removed in 2018 when linked to a €1.9-billion or $2.1-billion scandal of German payments processing firm Wirecard. The NBI investigated the case.
Matibag said it was “dismissed without prejudice, meaning it can be reopened whenever new evidence so warrants.”
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by jariusbondoc | Aug 7, 2026 | Gotcha
PNA Photo
Ex-senator Bong Revilla was allowed to post bail last Friday from non-bailable malversation raps.
“May trumabaho,” the ombudsman sneered Saturday.
On Tuesday a star witness testified to delivering P250-million malversed money to Revilla.
Revilla skipped the hearing, having paid P1-million bail.
Ombudsman Jesus Crispin Remulla’s remark insinuated ruses. Revilla’s counsel Ramon Esguerra manifested concern that it cast doubt on the integrity of the Sandiganbayan Third Division.
But Justices Ronald Moreno and Fritz delos Santos didn’t take offense. Moreno said that in his two decades as magistrate, “I have never been accused of being influenced, never been bribed and never inhibited.”
A Facebook reel on the controversial bail went viral. Political vlogger Chris Tan researched Moreno’s past rulings.
President Rody Duterte appointed Moreno to the anti-graft court in June 2018, Tan recounted. Three years later, Moreno was among four justices who cleared Makati ex-mayor Elenita Binay of malversation in overpriced hospital equipment.
In 2025, Moreno also penned the clearing of Makati ex-mayors Jojo and Junjun Binay of malversation, Tan added. It concerned what senators had scrutinized for overpriced parking building construction.
Tuesday’s star witness was DPWH ex-Usec. Roberto Bernardo. He swore to have brought P125-million cash to Revilla’s White House residence in 2024. Plus another P125 million in March 2025.
Driver-aide Vergel Niño Garcia also delivered P250 million in February 2025, Bernardo added.
The first delivery consisted of cash in six boxes and one paper bag. The second, 13 boxes. The third, six boxes.
The money was supposed to be for Revilla’s 2025 reelection campaign. He ran but lost under President Bongbong Marcos’ Alyansa para sa Bagong Pilipinas.
Malversation has four elements:
• offender is a public officer;
• he has custody or control of funds or property by reason of the duties of his office;
• government owns the funds or property involved for which he is accountable and
• he appropriated, took or misappropriated, or consented to, or through abandonment or negligence, permitted the taking by another person of such funds or property.
Malversation, like plunder, is non-bailable. Still, an accused can plead for bail as a matter of right. Justices hold bail hearings separate from the case proper.
Revilla’s bail petition was granted Friday morning. Custodians then brought him back to Quezon City Jail in Payatas, near Sandiganbayan. Lawyers worked on papers for the P1 million. Before dusk, Revilla was set free.
Revilla’s co-accused are DPWH Bulacan ex-district engineer Brice Hernandez, engineers Jaypee de Leon Mendoza, Arjay Salvador Domasig, Emelita Juat, accountant Juanito Mendoza and cashier Christina Mae Pineda.
The six have not been accorded bail.
On Tuesday Bernardo incriminated his ex-boss DPWH secretary Manuel Bonoan.
Bernardo detailed their modus operandi:
• Revilla approached him and asked for 25 percent “commitment fee.”
• Bonoan had access to DPWH allocations and discretion to set aside lump-sums for lawmakers who requested projects from him.
• Bonoan got 75 percent, and shared 25 percent each with Bernardo and fellow-Usec. Catalina Cabral (now deceased).
• Although denying participation in the ghost project in Pandi, Bulacan, Bernardo admitted to profiting from other lawmakers.
• Bernardo swore in his affidavit to have serviced Senators Jinggoy Estrada, Francis Escudero and former senator and Makati Mayor Nancy Binay.
Justices Moreno and Delos Santos concurred with Third Division chairman Justice Karl Miranda in denying bail to Revilla’s six co-accused.
Miranda dissented from Revilla’s bail grant, but was overruled by Moreno and Delos Santos, the decision author.
Justice Miranda asserted: “The prosecution was able to present strong evidence against Revilla to warrant the denial of his bail application… Alleged acts of Revilla may only be appreciated properly when contextualized in the kalakaran or scheme perpetrated in DPWH.
“There is strong evidence that Revilla committed the acts alleged in the Information, in furtherance of a conspiracy and this warrants the denial of his bail.
“It is not required to prove that Revilla personally intervened in congressional deliberations to ensure the funding of the project. It is sufficient to show that he committed overt acts, in the absence of which the project would not have been included in the General Appropriations Act.”
Revilla was among lawmakers implicated in 2013 in Janet Lim Napoles’ pork barrel scam. Despite acquittal in 2018, the Sandiganbayan ordered him to return P124.5 million. He refused because already declared innocent.
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by jariusbondoc | Dec 13, 2023 | Gotcha
The best defense is offense. China schemes to steal oil and gas in Recto Bank within Philippine exclusive economic zone. To avert that, the Philippines must extract the fuel for itself.
It can be done; it has been done. Up to two years ago China coveted Malaysia’s offshore petroleum. The latter held naval patrols with America and Australia while drilling for oil. Indonesia requested a US aircraft carrier sail-by as it drilled as well in Natuna Isles that China was grabbing.
Beijing shrieked. Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta coolly recited portions of Manila’s 2016 arbitral victory at The Hague against Beijing’s illegal claim over the entire South China Sea.
“Now China is quiet, while Malaysia and Indonesia enjoy their oil,” notes former Supreme Court Justice Antonio Carpio. “We should also invite naval allies to joint exercises while we drill in Recto.”
Recto has proven reserves. In 2013, the US Energy Information Administration estimated it at 5.4 billion barrels of oil and 55.1 trillion cubic feet of gas. That’s 63.5 times more oil and 20.5 times more gas than Malampaya, which will run out between 2024 and 2027.
National existence hangs on Recto replacing Malampaya. The latter fuels 40 percent of Luzon electricity. With no alternative, Luzon and parts of the Visayas will plunge into darkness.
Imagine the disaster. Water service, factories, offices, shops, telecoms, trains, schools, hospitals, hotels, diners, cinemas, churches will close. No work or classes from home either. Foreign investors will leave. Jobs will vanish.
Recto is a hundred miles from Palawan, within the Philippines’ 200-mile EEZ. It’s 650 miles from China’s southernmost province Hainan, thus outside its EEZ. The Hague arbitral court affirmed. China can’t claim it by imagined “nine-, ten- or 11-dash line.”
Although China snubbed the hearings, it’s bound by The Hague verdict under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. Its state-owned China National Offshore Oil Corp. has no right to drill there.
CNOOC cannot subcontract to private exploration firms, says Carpio. Shell, Occidental, Exxon, among others, are bound by international law, so will shun CNOOC.
Manila discovered gas in Recto’s Sampaguita fields in 1976. Three wells at 250 feet proved productive. The government awarded Service Contract-72 in 2002. Britain’s Forum Energy took interest in 2005. China repeatedly menaced its survey vessels.
Filipino magnate Manuel V. Pangilinan bought Forum to extract petroleum once and for all. Twice the Duterte admin delayed him to let CNOOC in, only to realize that the Chinese-state firm was only dribbling the ball. The Philippines also ran out of time.
Recto petroleum is why China is striving to dislodge BRP Sierra Madre from Ayungin Shoal. Ayungin (international name: Second Thomas) is at the entrance of Recto (Reed). The Philippine Navy beached its vessel there in 1999 to counter China’s 1995 occupation of nearby Panganiban (Mischief) Reef.
China’s Communist Party has long been craving Recto. Despite bannering China as an ancient civilization, CCP acts uncivilized.
Sierra Madre’s dozen or so Marines need regular supply and rotation. China Coast Guard gunboats ram and water cannon Filipino wooden civilian bancas ferrying food and other basic needs. Latest barbarism was on Dec. 10, the 75th anniversary of the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
China’s coast guards report to CCP’s military commission. They shouldn’t be in Panganiban or anywhere in or near Ayungin, or Rozul (Iroquois) and Escoda (Sabina) Shoals in Recto’s west and eastsides.
“We should repair Sierra Madre,” says international maritime lawyer Jay Batongbacal, PhD. But China bars it, so the World War II-vintage ship and Filipino defenders would crash into the sea.
CCP mobilizes jingoist Chinese for aggression. Among the blockers of last Sunday’s Ayungin resupply were a Chinese cargo ship and two maritime militia trawlers.
The previous day, other militia trawlers assisted Chinese coast guards in water cannoning two Philippine government vessels near Panatag (Scarborough) Shoal. The Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources was only bringing fuel and food to Filipino catchers outside the shoal, which China grabbed in 2012.
On Tuesday, Dec. 5, Chinese cargo steel ship M/V Tai Hang rammed a Filipino wooden boat. The sun was bright at 4 p.m. and the sea calm when – Huang! One of the five Filipinos thrown overboard was able to video two Chinese crewmen on deck ascertaining the hit-and-run.
At Recto in June 2019, a Chinese militia trawler switched off its light then rammed an anchored Filipino boat at midnight. It switched its light back on momentarily to check if the 26 Filipinos had fallen into the sea, then fled.
It’s time Filipinos took the offensive.
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by jariusbondoc | Dec 8, 2023 | Gotcha
TikTok went global in 2018. At once, security experts suspected it of being a Chinese cyber-espionage tool. Reasons against the micro-vlogging and e-commerce platform:
• It collects, uses and discloses users’ personal information. Substantial data are gathered without permission from other apps in the device. It draws sensitive data even when users don’t save or share content.
• TikTok developer ByteDance and founder Zhang Yiming are Chinese. In 2017 the China Communist Party enacted a National Intelligence Law. It compels Chinese companies and citizens to support domestic and overseas espionage and keep secret their participation.
Due to TikTok’s cyber-sabotage potential, several governments banned it from their devices. Foremost were China’s security disputants America, Canada, Britain, European Union, Australia, New Zealand and Japan. India forbade TikTok even in private mobiles and tablets.
ByteDance protested, citing company changes. It had opened to foreign shareholders. CEO Zhang had acquired US citizenship and emigrated to California’s Silicon Valley.
Its engineers were cooperating with concerned states to resolve security and privacy issues.
China’s foes were unconvinced. ByteDance and most overseas employees remain Chinese, all subject to CCP’s intelligence apparatus.
Tiktok’s overseas servers interconnect with those in China. Backdoors may exist surreptitiously to access unauthorized data, and malware planted to subvert.
The Philippines disagreed with security allies then. President Rodrigo Duterte professed love for Chinese President Xi Jinping. He allowed a new telco to set up cell sites inside military camps – a potential eavesdropping risk.
TikTok became a sensation not only among civilian government employees. Uniformed, intelligence and foreign affairs personnel also installed it in state-issued gadgets. Short videos were entertaining.
The National Security Agency now wants to prohibit TikTok from official devices due to disinformation capability. Reuters reports that Filipinos are among the top ten nationals who imbibe news mostly from TikTok.
NSA notices pro-China news and views – as China escalates aggression in the West Philippine Sea. “Disinformation operations, psychological warfare and other stuff are being done,” NSA Assistant Director Jonathan Malaya says.
He adds: “Banning wouldn’t be for those in the civilian sector, but for security, armed forces, uniformed personnel, intelligence.”
China is becoming more and more a surveillance state. It spies on its own citizens via millions of CCTVs in street corners. With artificial intelligence, each camera can detect 60 faces simultaneously, analyze up to 100 faces per second and store 1.8 billion images.
Abroad, CCP’s International Department has “influence fronts.” These are spying units disguised as Chinese citizens’ help centers or embedded in academe, industry, political and civic groups.
The US suffered 224 Chinese spying from 2001 to 2022. Forty-nine percent directly involved Chinese military or government employees, 41 percent were private Chinese citizens and ten percent were compromised US citizens.
Purposes overlapped: 46 percent of incidents were cyber espionage, 29 percent military technology theft, 54 percent commercial technology theft and 17 percent on politicians. That’s despite a 2015 deal by president Barack Obama with Xi to lessen snooping.
Europe detected six Chinese military fronts for cyber spying and hacking. The “advanced persistent threats” were seen “conducting malicious cyber activities against business and governments in the Union,” said the EU Agency for Cybersecurity and the Computer Emergency Response Team.
Upon special extension as CCP chairman in October 2022, Xi imposed a new rule. All Chinese companies are to have “party cells.” To avoid conflict, CEOs and proprietors swear allegiance to and parrot Xi’s quotations.
Within weeks, Nikkei Asia reported, more than two-thirds of Chinese firms traded in the Hong Kong Stock Exchange had articles of association with CCP.
TikTok’s parent firm cannot escape CCP assumption. But NSA must take care to speak of banning not for content but technological security. NSA can acquire info from intelligence partners Five Eyes and EU.
Information-Communication Technology Sec. Ivan Uy resists banning for content: “There has to be basis. [NSA] can have TikTok explain to us their technology … Not only [TikTok but] all social media are abused for disinformation and fake news.”
TikTok Philippines disavows CCP ties. “Shareholders own private companies like ByteDance,” Policy Officer Toff Rada asserts. “Who are they? Sixty percent are foreign global institutions like General Atlantic, Softbank, KKR; private investment companies, some Americans. Companies are run by boards of directors.
“None of ByteDance’s directors are with the Chinese government. Three are American. We have said again and again that TikTok is not in China. Parent company ByteDance has only one subsidiary operating there … In all these years, no one has produced even a shred of evidence that we have leaked data to the Chinese government.”
But that’s precisely because of the secrecy requirement of China’s intelligence law, a defense official counters: “Admit your cyber-snooping participation, and you and your family will go to prison.”
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