There’s obviously not going to be proof, it’d be huge news if there were. At the same time, I also wonder why people so adamantly defensive of TikTok in particular? It seems trivial enough to establish that they could exert an undue influence on a global audience through social media with just a few (I would think uncontroversial) assumptions
Social platforms have more than enough information to create a good idea of your politics, personality, and interests
Platforms such as TikTok operate on “pushing” content the algorithm wants instead of users “pulling” content they want to see
You are not immune to propaganda. Nobody is.
With a state ownership stake in the picture, it creates a pretty uneasy tension, right? If they know (1), they could just push ads and content which would help prime you emotionally and mentally to receive that advertising via mechanism (2). This is their actual business model.
Alternatively, if so motivated, they could just as easily use that same profile and mechanism to push content which nudges the content consumer in any myriad ways (politically, socially, etc.). Start with something that’s “close” to the viewer’s existing views, and cumulatively keep pushing content which leads folks down pipelines. They don’t even need to make the content. The users create it; the sentiment, quality, and popularity data informs which shorts to push where; refine the model based on receptivity; repeat as necessary.
Given (3), especially at the scale we’re talking about with TikTok, I think it’s obviously possible that the platform could be used to meaningfully influence public opinion, sow discord, spread misinformation, whatever. Whether they actually do this is purely speculative, but I also have a hard time thinking people would be quite so enthusiastically defensive of a similar social platform under direct influence from their own government?