The potential Tiktok ban, which takes effect in the United States on Sunday, has many Americans turning to alternative platforms.
Earlier this week they found a solution – the Chinese app Xiaohongshu, which translated into Swedish means “little red book”.
The app’s translated name has drawn attention from both social media users and US media for being similar to the name of the book “Mao’s Little Red”, written by Communist China’s founder Mao Zedong. Among English-speaking users, the platform is called “Red Note”, “Red book” or just “Red”.
The greeting: “We are so glad you are here”
Several American Tiktok users are encouraging others to download Red Note.
“If anyone else in the US is wondering where to go, check out Red Note,” says one Tiktok user.
“They post just like you do on Tiktok. And the Chinese users are so cute “we are so happy you are here, we hope you stay” they greet us.
Under the hashtag “Tiktok refugees” there are millions of videos that describe, among other things, how to proceed when you download and start using the app.
In just a few days, Rednote has gained over 700,000 new users, most of whom are Americans.
But now the app’s popularity has also spread to other countries.
The popularity has spread to Sweden – but the expert warns
In Sweden, Rednote is currently the most downloaded social media app in the App store and ranks first in the top list of the most popular free apps, all categories, on Google Play.
Data security expert Benjamin Särkkä now urges caution.
– The security risks with the app itself are poorly known. It has not been investigated nearly as much as Tiktok or the other social media, says Särkkä Swedish EPN.
He urges users not to give out too much information about themselves.
– Check the settings and see how you can limit who sees the material, depending of course on how you want to use the app. If you want to build a large following, of course it pays to try to get the material out to as many people as possible. Then it is perhaps more a question of trying to defend one’s privacy and identity so that the followers do not find, for example, where you live.
There have been reports of censorship
Red Note was launched back in 2013 and today has around 300 million monthly active users.
Like Tiktok, there have also been reports of censorship of Chinese criticism on Rednote. In December 2022, Taiwan’s government banned public sector employees from using Xiaohongshu on work phones, due to the app allegedly posing a national security risk, according to several US media outlets.
The company behind the app, Xingin Information Technology, was founded by Charlwin Mao and Miranda Qu and is headquartered in Shanghai.