TikTok, US lawmakers, Chinese Communist Party
TikTok to US lawmakers: Data Not Decided to share With Chinese Communist Party
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This week, TikTok attempted to reassure US senators that it is taking all necessary steps to limit access to customers’ data from outside the US, including by employees of its holding company, the Chinese group ByteDance. The social media company responded in writing to nine Republican US senators’ questions about its data storage and retrieval policies on Thursday. The New York Times first published the letter, but TikTok has since confirmed its content to AFP.

TikTok had indicated in mid-June, in response to earlier inquiries from US authorities, that all of its data on US-based users was now stored on US-based servers controlled by the American company Oracle.
TikTok confirmed in a letter on Thursday that employees based in China had direct exposure to US users’ data, but only within “comprehensive cybersecurity controls and authorization authorization protocols” overseen by the company’s “US-based security team.”

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The company told the legislators that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had never asked for information about American users.

“We have not offered US user data to the CCP, and would not if asked,” the company stated.

Officials from TikTok also stated that while ByteDance engineers could work on the platform’s algorithms, the new process requires them to do so only in Oracle’s computing environment, without extracting data from it.
The popular social media platform is currently being assessed by the Advisory board on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), an inter-agency government review board that evaluates the risks of foreign investments to US national security.

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Former President Donald Trump was concerned about the safety of the platform’s data during his presidency and attempted to force ByteDance to sell its subsidiary to Oracle.

He also issued executive orders outright prohibiting the service in the United States, but those never took effect and were later rescinded by his successor, Joe Biden.

Nonetheless, President Biden has charged his administration with assessing the potential risks involved in foreign ownership of social media websites and apps.