A commissioner from the US communications regulator is asking Apple and Google to consider banning TikTok from their app stores due to data security concerns related to the Chinese company.
Brendan Carr, commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), wrote a letter to the two companies’ CEOs warning them that the hugely popular video-sharing app did not meet the requirements of their app store policies.
“TikTok is not what it seems on the surface. This is not just an app for sharing funny videos or memes. This is the sheep’s clothing, “Carr said in the letter. “Basically, TikTok functions as an advanced monitoring tool that collects large amounts of personal and sensitive data.”
“It is clear that TikTok poses an unacceptable risk to national security due to its extensive data collection, which is combined with Beijing’s apparently unverified access to this sensitive data.
TikTok is not just another video application.
This is the sheepskin garment.
It collects pieces of sensitive data that new reports say are available in Beijing.
I called pic.twitter.com/Le01fBpNjn
– @BrendanCarrFCC
In the letter, Carr lists numerous cases of the company violating various data privacy and security laws around the world. He asks Google and Apple to eliminate the possibility of using the application on their phones.
If they refuse to do so by July 8, he requires a response from them, explaining “the basis for your company’s conclusion that secret access to private and sensitive user data in the United States by Beijing residents combined with the TikTok model for misleading representations and behavior do not conflict with any of your app store policies. “
The letter comes after the US news agency Buzzfeed reported last week that data on US users had been repeatedly made available by entities in mainland China. TikTok subsequently announced plans to “delete US users’ personal data from our own data centers and fully target Oracle’s cloud servers located in the United States,” the company said.
“Unlimited access” to data
John Zabiuk, chairman of the cybersecurity program at the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology, says moving servers to the United States may seem like an easy solution, but it doesn’t solve the root of the problem.
“The problem is who still has access to this data? It’s still TikTok,” he said in an interview with CBC, adding that if the company has access to the data, it’s safe to assume that the Chinese government also has access.
“This is an extremely dangerous application,” he said. “It captures so much personal information about consumers and the data is stored in many cases in mainland China, where the government has unrestricted access.”
This is not the first time the company has been criticized in the United States for its ties to the Chinese government. Former US President Donald Trump has repeatedly criticized the company, trying to ban the company by executive order.
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This led to talks between US companies, including Oracle, Microsoft and even Walmart, to buy the company, but those talks fell apart after legal challenges and the plan was then postponed by the incoming Biden administration, which ordered a review of the application’s national security. is in progress. As early as last week, six Republican senators asked the Ministry of Finance for up-to-date information on how this review is going.
Zabiuk says it certainly seems that the app works against Google and Apple’s own application rules because of the way it’s built.
“They can make code changes, and every time you run the app … it can do different things,” he said.
If the click is successful, it won’t even be the first time TikTok has been banned in a country. India banned the application in 2020 for reasons of national security.
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