[News] Why are countries trying to ban TikTok?

[Draeno]

 

In recent months, lawmakers in the United States, Europe and Canada have intensified their efforts to restrict access to TikTok, the po[CENSORED]r short-video app owned by Chinese company ByteDance, claiming it puts your security at risk.

Last Monday, the White House told federal agencies they had 30 days to delete the app from government devices. Canada and the executive branch of the European Union also banned the app from official devices recently.

On Wednesday, a House committee backed a much more extreme move, voting to advance legislation that would allow President Joe Biden to ban TikTok from all devices in the country.

Here's why the pressure has increased on TikTok, which has claimed it's used by more than 100 million Americans.

Why are governments banning TikTok?
It all comes down to China.

Lawmakers and regulators in the West have increasingly expressed concern that TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, could put sensitive user data, such as location information, in the hands of the Chinese government. They have pointed to laws that allow the Chinese government to secretly request data from Chinese companies and citizens for intelligence-gathering operations. They are also concerned that China could use TikTok's content recommendations to misinform.

TikTok has long denied such accusations and has tried to distance itself from ByteDance.

Are there countries that have already banned TikTok?
India banned the platform in mid-2020, costing ByteDance one of its biggest markets, as the government cracked down on 59 Chinese-owned apps, alleging they secretly transmitted user data to servers outside of India.

What is happening with the prohibitions in the United States?
Since November, more than two dozen states have banned the use of TikTok on government devices, and many universities — including the University of Texas at Austin, Auburn University and Boise State University — have blocked the app from their campus Wi-Fi networks. The app has already been banned from government devices for the Army, Navy, Air Force and Coast Guard for three years. But the bans don't usually extend to personal devices. And students often switch to their mobile provider's data to use the app.

Is Congress trying to ban TikTok?
Some congressmen would like it to be so. This week, the House Foreign Relations Committee voted to pass a bill that could give the president the authority to ban the platform altogether (the courts previously halted an effort by the Trump administration to do this).

 

https://www.elespectador.com/mundo/america/por-que-los-paises-estan-tratando-de-prohibir-tiktok-noticias-hoy/