The US Senate has unanimously voted to ban the popular app TikTok from the work phones of US government officials. According to the bill’s initiator, the Chinese app is “a Trojan horse for the Chinese Communist Party”.
However, the bill still has to pass the House of Representatives before the law takes effect.
There is a lot of fear in the United States that TikTok and parent company ByteDance could share information from American users with Chinese authorities. FBI director Christopher Wray warned last month that Chinese companies are required by law to share information if the Chinese government wants to.
The US government has already tried to reach an agreement with TikTok. It had to provide additional security guarantees for storing user data, insiders report to the Bloomberg news agency. However, that agreement fell through after the Department of Justice blocked it.
It is also questionable to what extent the agreement can protect American users’ data against misuse.
