If Chinese-owned TikTok is definitively deemed a national security threat by the US, it’s hard to see how the UK or other Western countries might come to a different conclusion.
But the fact that Donald Trump came into the White House to talk about a reprieve for the video-sharing network that restored service after a day of power outages across the United States is an example of something much simpler: Trump-style geopolitics. suggests that it is working.
Trump, who has 14.8 million TikTok followers, has his own reasons for being cautious about shutting down the app. Instead, his focus is on forcing at least a partial sale of TikTok US to its docile American owners, although reports of a sale to Trump ally Elon Musk, the app’s owner, Dismissed by ByteDance as “pure fiction”.
The U.S. security argument against TikTok stems from a simple concern that large amounts of user data could be leaked to China and ultimately end up in the hands of China’s ruling Communist Party.
TikTok’s privacy policy acknowledges that it collects large amounts of personal data, such as phone numbers and email addresses. Device and video location. Usage patterns – your phone and social network contact lists, and the list of people who link them.
Some of it is stored internationally, including in Singapore, Malaysia, the U.S. and Ireland, and some is processed in China, including data used to train recommendation algorithms, as highlighted by the U.S. Supreme Court.
But it’s also worth noting that TikTok is not alone in that many other apps collect large amounts of user data. “The security systems for personal data across social media and other apps are so broken that TikTok is hardly an issue,” said Ciaran Martin, former head of Britain’s cybersecurity agency NCSC.
TikTok has admitted that it accessed the accounts of two tech journalists (in fact, in one case, her cat account) for sources for articles about itself. However, other allegations of covert interference by the Chinese Communist Party were dismissed by a US court amid concerns over the credibility of central witnesses.
Former FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress in January that TikTok could allow China to “control the collection of data on millions of users and use it for all kinds of espionage and influence operations.” warned. But in reality, these concerns are mostly theoretical.
While there is no denying that the Chinese government is involved in hacking Western computer systems for purposes of espionage, theft of intellectual property, and obtaining personal data, there is evidence that TikTok is a vehicle for ongoing mass surveillance. There isn’t.
The recent intrusion into U.S. phone networks by Chinese hackers dubbed Salt Typhoon did not utilize Chinese software, but instead “hacked infrastructure built by the U.S. and other Western countries.” Martin added.
Although TikTok is not available in China (ByteDance operates its sister app Douyin there) and is not subject to overt censorship along Communist Party lines, its soft power has influenced young people in independent Taiwan to become more pro-life. It is argued that it has become Chinese.
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A switch to explicit interference would likely be a major policy change similar to the one Musk adopted after acquiring Twitter.
National security concerns about TikTok were accepted without debate by the U.S. Supreme Court last week. The justices focused on whether Congress’ proposed ban on TikTok violated U.S. free speech protections. The court concluded that U.S. law did not do so because “national security concerns regarding TikTok’s data collection practices and relationships with foreign adversaries” prevailed.
In the UK, concerns about government data leaks led to the decision to ban TikTok from the phones of ministers and civil servants in March 2023. But the idea of a national ban was dismissed on Sunday by the Treasury’s security chief, Darren Jones, who said: “The fact that consumers want to post videos of their cats or dancing is a national security concern to me.” I don’t think it’s a threat.” ”.
This is a position that British intelligence officials have also expressed for some time. Former GCHQ chief Jeremy Fleming said he would encourage young people to use TikTok.
But if the debate over TikTok is actually a geopolitical battle between the US and China, the small UK would be best advised to stay out of the way. “It makes sense to see how this plays out in the U.S. first,” Martin says. “Because if the US succeeds in selling TikTok, the problem will be solved.”
