Technology & National Security
NewsOnScale Staff
October 25, 2026
Discord is where Americans talk. Gamers. Students. Military veterans. Government employees. Small businesses. Political organizers. 200 million monthly active users communicating through voice, video, and text on a platform that does not have end-to-end encryption.
Tencent — the Chinese technology conglomerate with direct ties to the Chinese Communist Party — owns a stake in Discord.
That stake was acquired through Discord's Series C, E, and F funding rounds between 2016 and 2018. Tencent also operates WeChat — the dominant messaging platform in China that the Chinese government uses to monitor, censor, and control communication among its citizens.
The same company that built the surveillance infrastructure of Chinese digital communication owns a piece of the platform 200 million Americans use to communicate every month.
What Tencent is
Tencent is not a normal company that happens to be based in China. Under China's National Intelligence Law passed in 2017, all Chinese companies are legally required to cooperate with Chinese intelligence agencies and to provide user data when requested. The law applies regardless of where the data is held or where the company operates.
Tencent operates WeChat — which the Chinese government has full access to. Tencent owns stakes in over 1,200 companies worldwide. Those investments are not purely financial. They are strategic — acquiring access, data, and influence across the global technology ecosystem.
Tencent's investment in Discord gives it a financial stake in a platform where hundreds of millions of people communicate without encryption. Discord's own privacy policy states it may share data with investors.
The Trump administration has acknowledged the concern. Earlier in 2026 the administration considered requiring Tencent to divest its stakes in several major gaming and technology companies including Discord — citing national security concerns. No action has been taken as of this writing.
What Discord doesn't have
Discord does not have end-to-end encryption. Unlike Signal or WhatsApp — where messages are encrypted so that even the platform cannot read them — Discord's messages are readable by Discord and potentially by anyone Discord shares data with.
Discord has said it does not sell data to third parties. Its privacy policy says it may share data with parent companies and investors.
Tencent is an investor.
The portfolio Tencent has built
Tencent's American investments extend far beyond Discord. The company owns significant stakes in Riot Games — the maker of League of Legends, one of the most played games in the world. It owns stakes in Epic Games — the maker of Fortnite, played by hundreds of millions of people worldwide including children. It has invested in Snapchat and Reddit.
The pattern is consistent. Tencent acquires minority stakes in the communication, entertainment, and social platforms used most heavily by young Americans. The data those platforms generate — behavioral patterns, communication habits, social networks, location data, purchasing behavior — flows through companies in which the Chinese government has a financial interest and over which it has legal authority to demand information.
The comparison the US government makes
The US government banned TikTok — or tried to — because it is owned by a Chinese company and therefore subject to Chinese law requiring data sharing with the government.
TikTok is owned by ByteDance which is subject to Chinese law.
Discord has Tencent as an investor. Tencent is subject to Chinese law.
The legal exposure is structurally similar. The response from the US government has been structurally different. TikTok faced a ban and years of congressional scrutiny. Discord faces no equivalent pressure despite Tencent's presence on its cap table.
Who uses Discord
Discord began as a gaming communication platform. It has since become the default communication infrastructure for communities of every kind — political organizing, business collaboration, academic research, military veterans, and increasingly government-adjacent work.
The platform that the Chinese government has a financial interest in, that has no end-to-end encryption, and whose privacy policy permits data sharing with investors is the platform 200 million Americans have made their primary communication tool.
The question nobody is asking
The US government spent years fighting TikTok over Chinese data access concerns. It deployed military missile systems around Mar-a-Lago to protect one man's private residence. It has 18 intelligence agencies consuming $115 billion per year to protect American security.
It has taken no definitive action on the Chinese government's financial stake in the unencrypted communication platform used by 200 million Americans every month.
The platform where your children talk. Where military veterans coordinate. Where political movements organize. Where businesses communicate. Where your neighbors share information.
Tencent has a stake in it. China has a law requiring Tencent to share data with its government. Discord does not use end-to-end encryption.
Nobody in Washington is making this the urgent national security conversation it should be.
NewsOnScale is owned by AMILLI AI, Corp., founded by JJ Johnson. JJ Johnson is a declared 2028 presidential candidate. FEC filing: JJJOHNSON2028.