The United States increases the pressure on TikTok: more bans for alleged Chinese espionage

The United States House of Representatives came forward in advance against Tick ​​tock: banned the use of the social network on the devices of its members as part of an escalation that has increased in recent times.

The director of the body which depends on the Legislative Power in that country has ordained his staff delete the app of the Chinese company ByteDance, considered “high risk due to its security issues”.

As published by the Reuters news agency, the authorities have promised to contact all lawmakers to make sure they comply with the measure of removing their accounts from the platform and will take steps to prevent downloads of an app targeted by alleged espionage and handing over data to the Chinese government.

The confrontation between these two international powers explains the rejection of TikTok, owned by a Chinese company, in the United States.

The escalation of the conflict between the United States and TikTok

The escalation of the conflict reached its peak during the presidency of Donald Trump, who directly sought to veto the use of the video application and subsequently pushed for TikTok’s operations in the US market to be taken over by a local company .

A few months after the arrival of the Democrat Joe Biden in the White House and when everything seemed that an impasse would occur in the conflict, tension quickly returned to the scene with the recent decision of the United States House of Representatives.

This week, US government officials considered requiring ByteDance to sell its US unit, according to the Wall Street Journal. The foreign investment committee said the purpose is to “address TikTok’s security concerns.”

As Reuters noted, 19 states have also banned or partially banned installation and use of the app on staff devices they own or operate.

Similarly, was the bill called “No TikTok,” which plans to ban the use of the app on government devices unanimously approved in the Senate American and final compliance is awaited.

Even FBI director Chris Way called TikTok a “Trojan horse of the Communist Party of China” to spy on users and authorities.

However, the company that commands TikTok has shown its intentions to bring transparency to its US operations fire four employees who spied on users.

According to a New York Times report, employees had access to IP addresses and other data linked to reporters from the Financial Times and Buzzfeed News, who have criticized ByteDance’s actions over alleged privacy violations.

TikTok’s Response: “We’re Disappointed”

TikTok spokeswoman Brooke Oberwetter recently told Engadget that the company is “disappointed that Congress has taken steps to ban TikTok on government devices.”

Furthermore, the spokesman described that decision as a “political gesture that will do nothing to advance national security interests”.

SL