This week on Beyond The Billions, Forbes Deputy Editor Giacomo Tognini welcomes Forbes senior writer Emily Baker-White, author of Every Screen on the Planet: The War Over Tik Tok, for a deep dive into the world’s most powerful app. Emily explains how TikTok’s parent company ByteDance, founded by Zhang Yiming in 2012, created an unparalleled recommendations algorithm that analyzes your “revealed preferences”, claiming to know you “better than you know yourself”.
However, this explosive success came with a significant security risk. Baker-White details how the app’s structure made millions of Americans’ data “really easily accessible” to ByteDance employees in China. Learn why this seemingly “sunny place on the internet” ultimately became a definitive national security threat.
00:00 This Week’s Billionaires Recap
01:41 From Tech Lawyer to Investigative Reporter
04:33 The Techno-Optimist Who Founded an Empire
08:08 The Algorithm That Knows You Better Than You Know Yourself
14:15 The “Last Sunny Place” Faces the Chinese Government
20:04 Project Texas: Untangling the Spaghetti Code
23:25 The Spying Scandal That Proved the Worst Fears
28:05 The Fight to Ban: From Trump’s Courts to Biden’s Law
38:15 The Current Deal: Why the Algorithm is Not for Sale
To read about the new billionaires from popular AI coding tool Cursor: https://www.forbes.com/sites/rashishrivastava/2025/11/13/four-cofounders-of-popular-ai-coding-tool-cursor-are-now-billionaires/
To read about the new funding round for Kim Kardashian’s apparel company Skims: https://www.forbes.com/sites/chasewithorn/2025/11/12/kim-kardashian-is-richer-than-ever-after-new-skims-funding-round/
To read about the successful rocket launch by Jeff Bezos’ space company Blue Origin: https://www.forbes.com/sites/the-prototype/2025/11/14/jeff-bezos-blue-origin-launched-a-nasa-mars-mission/
To buy Emily’s book: https://www.amazon.com/Every-Screen-Planet-Over-Tiktok/dp/1324086661
To read more about TikTok’s recent changes to its policies: https://www.forbes.com/sites/emilybaker-white/2025/10/21/tiktok-wont-say-if-its-giving-ice-your-data/
To read about the deal for TiKTok’s U.S. operations: https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbeswealthteam/2025/09/25/the-web-of-billionaire-pals-partners-and-trump-supporters-taking-control-of-tiktok-us/
To read about ByteDance’s plans to use TikTok to monitor American citizens’ physical locations: https://www.forbes.com/sites/emilybaker-white/2022/10/20/tiktok-bytedance-surveillance-american-user-data/
To read about how TikTok spied on American journalists: https://www.forbes.com/sites/emilybaker-white/2022/12/22/tiktok-tracks-forbes-journalists-bytedance/
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