Fakoyejo OlalekanThe operation of video-sharing app, TikTok, is under threat from the United States Government. The US demanded that appstores owned by Google and Apple should take down the Chinese app.
US made the request through the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), extending a long drawn battle between the American government and TikTok, starting from the administration of Donald Trump.
Trump had directed that TikTok be either deleted or the Chinese app sells its US operation to an American buyer or investor. The administration of the current President, Joe Biden, has also been critical of the video-sharing app.
While Trump banned TikTok in September 2020, resulting to a court case filed by ByteDance, the parent company of the video-sharing app, Biden has chosen the option of stricter regulatory oversight over the firm’s operation.
Countries against TikTok
Aside the US, TikToc has also faced challenges in India, after being permanently banned from the country in January 2021, alongside over 50 other Chinese apps. Bangladesh, Indonesia, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Despite ByteDance being a Chinese company, TikTok is not available in China, with the only allowing the usage of Douyin, an alternative version of the app – but Douyin is available outside China like TikTok.
TikTok is also facing a lawsuit in the United Kingdom for allowing eight to 12-year-olds to access its platform, against the prohibition that enables ages from 13-year-old upward to use the Chinese app.
In Canada, TikTok was also sued for illegal data collection. Although it denied the allegation, the company ended settling to pay $2 million.
Why the US wants TikTok banned?
In a letter dated June 24, to Google and Apple, FCC Commissioner, Brendan Carr, said TikTok is allowing access to private data belonging to American citizens in China, and harvesting extensive amounts of personal and sensitive data.
The US government has alleged that TikTok poses risk to the national security of the country, and shouldn’t allow it to continue operating in America, to protect citizens from the Chinese government.
“As you know TikTok is an app that is available to millions of Americans through your app stores, and it collects vast troves of sensitive data about those US users. TikTok is owned by Beijing-based ByteDance — an organization that is beholden to the Communist Party of China and required by the Chinese law to comply with PRC’s surveillance demands.
“It is clear that TikTok poses an unacceptable national security risk due to its extensive data harvesting being combined with Beijing’s apparently unchecked access to that sensitive data.
“I am writing the two of you because Apple and Google hold themselves out as operating app stores that are safe and trusted places to discover and download apps. Nonetheless, Apple and Google have reviewed and approved the TikTok app for inclusion in your respective app stores. Indeed, statistics show that TikTok has been downloaded from the Apple App Store and Google Play Store nearly 19 million times in the first quarter of this year alone.
“It is clear that TikTok poses an unacceptable national security risk due to its extensive data harvesting being combined with Beijing’s apparently unchecked access to that data. Therefore, I am requesting that you apply the plain text of your app store policies to TikTok and remove it from your app stores for failure to abide by those terms.” Carr wrote.
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