Members from the United States Congress have questioned TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew about the social media app’s safety.
The US has threatened to outright ban the corporation if it continues under Chinese ownership.
Due to security concerns, many Western governments take action against other Chinese technology businesses.
What restriction is TikTok facing?
TikTok a shot video creation and sharing platform owned by the Chinese company ByteDance.
It debuted in 2016 and has since grown to become the world’s third most popular internet service, with over a billion active monthly users.
On government devices in Belgium, Canada, Denmark, New Zealand, Taiwan, the UK, and the United States, the app has been restricted.
The EU directed its staff to remove the software from phones provided to them as well as private devices with official apps running.
TikTok has been completely prohibited in India because of security concerns.
Afghanistan has also banned it to protect young people from being “misled.”
Why are countries concerned about TikTok’s security?
TikTok collects the same kind of user data as other social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram.
Name, age, phone number, email address, and image are included.
According to FBI Director Chris Wray, China’s 2017 National Intelligence Law mandates firms to “do whatever the government wants them to do in terms of presenting them with intelligence or serving as a tool for the Chinese government.”
TikTok also has a “For You” feed that recommends video clips for viewers to watch, which experts think is better designed than those used by Facebook or Youtube.
“TikTok has a more complicated technique in terms of showing content to its users,” explains Dr. Maryam Mehrnezhad of the Department of Information Security at Royal Holloway, University of London. “This makes misinformation easier to spread and identification and detection more difficult.”
What are the other Chinese technologies that have been targeted?
Chinese 5G technology companies like Huawei, ZTE, and Hytera have been prohibited from deploying network equipment in Australia, the United States, Japan, India, and Canada.
The UK government has directed that Huawei equipment installed on 5G networks be removed by 2027.
Because of security worries about China’s supercomputing and AI technology development, the US and Dutch governments have blocked semiconductor exports to the country.
Chinese-made security cameras have been ordered removed from vital facilities by the United Kingdom and Australian governments.
Governments are afraid that Chinese firms’ 5G equipment installed in foreign networks would include “backdoors” through which data can be transferred back to Beijing.
Thanks to companies like Hikvision, China is the world’s largest producer of security cameras. These devices could be relaying intelligence to China invisibly.
According to Jake Moore, global security advisor for ESET, an internet security company, there is no convincing proof that China is using its IT firms for espionage.
What does China have to say about technological restrictions?
The sanctions on TikTok and other tech businesses have been termed “political theater” by China’s foreign ministry, which claims that the US is “exaggerating national security concerns in order to oppress other nations’ industries.”
TikTok claims to collect no more data than other social media applications and that it is fully independent of the government.
It confirmed in 2022 that some of its employees in China might have access to user data obtained in Europe, but it says it is working hard to keep such data within Europe.
It also says that data from US consumers are being processed in the United States rather than China.
Analysts believe that the success of Chinese apps in the US is due in part to fierce competition in their local market, where US apps are outlawed.
“The Chinese software enterprises have had such an intense era of competitiveness at home that has made them as good, if not better, in certain areas than US apps,” Zeyi Yang, an MIT Review journalist and researcher specializing in Chinese technology, said.
Other Chinese companies, such as TikTok and the instant messaging service WeChat, have also been pioneers in developing highly tailored recommendation algorithms to satisfy user requests.
TikTok is the first Chinese-owned app to reach considerable global popularity, but American politicians and national security experts have warned that Chinese-owned apps may face data privacy violations and censorship by the Chinese Communist Party.
Because of the same concern, the European Commission, the United Kingdom, and Canada have all banned TikTok from government employees’ phones.
Mr. Scherer believes there are no such avenues in China, but US-based computer companies like Apple have fought protracted court battles to block government requests for their users’ data.
“At the end of the day,” he added, “if the Chinese Communist Party says [a Chinese-owned company] has to do something, they don’t have a choice.”
Read Also: TikTok: Canada bans app on government devices
TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew attempted to assuage lawmakers’ fears about security by declaring that a “firewall” is in place to protect Americans.
TikTok told the BBC that US user data was not accessible to international organizations. The BBC also sought comments from the other applications.
Mr. Scherer believes that unless US legislators establish robust data privacy legislation, any program, regardless of which country controls it, could be exposed to data breaches.
