I would never claim that China is performing less surveillance of its citizens. They definitely are a world leader in this, in a very bad way.

However, mindless commenters spamming social credit demerits on any post that mentions China only serve to feed the exaggerations and inaccuracies.

Fine, what national security obligations are US-based social media companies meeting that TikTok/ByteDance is not?

Like what? What are American companies required to do to protect your privacy that TikTok doesn’t do because they are a Chinese company?

There has been a widespread misconception that China operates a nationwide and unitary social credit “score” based on individuals’ behavior, leading to punishments if the score is too low. Media reports in the West have sometimes exaggerated or inaccurately described this concept.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Credit_System

That’s a harder question to answer and depends more on your own moral compass. Do you believe that having better defensive capabilities empowers the users of your creation to feel safe enough to do evil things? I certainly don’t think you could absolve the makers of anti-missile systems who supply militaries that are committing genocide.

Doesn’t make you any less responsible when the fruits of your labor are used to murder civilians.