What the company is facing Tik Tok Chinese House of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy announced Sunday that lawmakers will move forward with legislation to address national security concerns about TikTok, claiming that the Chinese government has access to the app’s user data.
McCarthy, who belongs to the Republican Party, said on Twitter: “It is very disturbing that the CEO of TikTok cannot tell the truth and acknowledge what we already know is true, which is that China has the right to access the data of TikTok users.”
It’s very concerning that the CEO of TikTok can’t be honest and admit what we already know to be true—China has access to TikTok user data.
The House will be moving forward with legislation to protect Americans from the technological tentacles of the Chinese Communist Party.
— Kevin McCarthy (@SpeakerMcCarthy) March 26, 2023
long questioning
The CEO of the company Tik Tok Xu Zi Zhu faced a lengthy grilling from US lawmakers Thursday about the video-sharing app’s alleged ties to China and the danger it poses to teenagers.
Zhu said during the session that “ByteDance Company (which owns the application) is not affiliated with or controlled by the Chinese government and is a private company,” adding that “60% of the company is owned by international investment institutions. 20% is owned by its founder and 20% is owned by employees all over the world.” , according to AFP.
CEO of the TikTok application Shu Shi Zhu before Congress in Washington, Thursday (Reuters)
“clear transparent rules”
As he explained: “We believe what is needed is clear, transparent rules that apply to all technology companies — ownership is not a basis for addressing these concerns.”
But he pointed out that some US data is still available to the company’s employees in China, saying: “Today, there is still some data that we need to delete.”
Calls are mounting in the United States to ban TikTok, which is owned by China-based ByteDance, or to pass a bipartisan bill to give President Joe Biden the administrative legal authority to request a ban. Recently, the app was banned from downloading on US government-owned devices.
