{"id":1542949,"date":"2022-07-07T13:04:06","date_gmt":"2022-07-07T17:04:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1542949"},"modified":"2022-07-07T13:04:19","modified_gmt":"2022-07-07T17:04:19","slug":"tiktok-claimed-it-doesnt-share-data-with-communist-china-but-evidence-says-u-s-users-are-compromised","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/tiktok-claimed-it-doesnt-share-data-with-communist-china-but-evidence-says-u-s-users-are-compromised\/","title":{"rendered":"TikTok Claimed It Doesn\u2019t Share Data With Communist China But Evidence Says U.S. Users Are Compromised"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">32<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Ftiktok-claimed-it-doesnt-share-data-with-communist-china-but-evidence-says-u-s-users-are-compromised%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1542949&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/07\/pexels-cottonbro-5081930.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<p>Executives at ByteDance-owned TikTok likely lied to Congress about the social media company\u2019s relationship with China and how much access the communist country has to U.S. user data.<\/p>\n<p>When the Trump administration was actively working to <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2020\/09\/18\/commerce-department-to-ban-tiktok-and-wechat-downloads-in-the-u-s-starting-sunday\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">ban ByteDance\u2019s TikTok and WeChat<\/a> due to national security concerns in the fall of 2020, ByteDance Global Chief Security Officer Roland Cloutier <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cyberscoop.com\/tiktok-lawsuit-security-questions-roland-cloutier\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">reassured Cyberscoop<\/a> that \u201cwe simply don\u2019t share data with governments, including the Chinese government.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Michael Beckerman, TikTok\u2019s head of public policy for the Americas, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/technology\/tiktok-tells-us-lawmakers-it-does-not-give-information-chinas-government-2021-10-26\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">also explicitly told<\/a> the Senate Commerce Committee during a hearing in October of 2021 that \u201cwe do not share information with the Chinese government,\u201d but as Sens. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Mark Warner, D-Va., noted in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.warner.senate.gov\/public\/_cache\/files\/3\/e\/3eeb87b3-e9b5-4aa4-8ea1-361a8472ff46\/A42795C63518B32671F9ACCF82B1E26A.khan-ssci-tiktok-letter.pdf?utm_source=newsletter&#038;utm_medium=email&#038;utm_campaign=newsletter_axiosam&#038;stream=top\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">recent letter<\/a> to Federal Trade Commission Chairwoman Lina Khan, that clearly isn\u2019t the case. <\/p>\n<p>Despite Beckerman\u2019s insistence that the popular social media app has \u201cno affiliation\u201d with Beijing ByteDance Technology, which the Chinese Communist Party <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/world\/china\/beijing-owns-stakes-bytedance-weibo-domestic-entities-records-show-2021-08-17\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">bought a stake in<\/a> and the board of which it infiltrated last year, Buzzfeed found that TikTok divisions such as the United States Technical Services team\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.buzzfeednews.com\/article\/emilybakerwhite\/tiktok-project-texas-bytedance-user-data\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">report to ByteDance executives in China<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Leaked audio from at least 80 internal TikTok meetings also revealed that skeptics of TikTok\u2019s data privacy practices were right: ByteDance employees in the surveillance state of China repeatedly accessed sensitive, private U.S. user data including \u201cbirthdates, phone numbers, and device identification information.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>The Department of Justice <a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2020\/09\/26\/917134452\/new-doj-filing-tiktoks-owner-is-a-mouthpiece-of-chinese-communist-party\">found in 2020<\/a> that ByteDance employs at least 130 CCP members at its Beijing office. That\u2019s something Chinese propaganda outlets have boasted about. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cAccording to Chinese press reporting, Bytedance has more party members and party organizations and is more \u2018red,\u2019 insiders pointed out, as compared with other Internet companies,\u201d a memorandum from the former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Intelligence and Security at the Department of Commerce John Costello <a href=\"https:\/\/www.documentcloud.org\/documents\/7218234-MEMORANDUM-for-the-SECRETARY.html\">stated<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>This deliberate breach of policy and suspect intelligence gathering is well known among TikTok\u2019s Trust and Safety department. In a recording of a September 2021 meeting, one director even admitted there is a Beijing-based engineer who \u201chas access to everything.\u201d That dishonestly accessed information is in addition to any non-public data the CCP could solicit following the implementation of its national security laws. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cUnder these authorities, the CCP may compel access, regardless of where data is ultimately stored,\u201d Warner and Rubio warned in their letter to Khan. \u201cWhile TikTok has suggested that migrating to U.S.-based storage from a U.S. cloud service provider alleviates any risk of unauthorized access, these latest revelations raise concerns about the reliability of TikTok representations: since TikTok will ultimately control all access to the cloud-hosted systems, the risk of access to that data by PRC-based engineers (or CCP security services) remains significant in light of the corporate governance irregularities revealed by BuzzFeed News.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Since the beginning of its popularity in the United States, TikTok has felt the wrath of several politicians who have scrutinized the practices of the app its connection to the CCP and even tried to revive a <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2021\/04\/15\/senate-republicans-take-another-run-at-banning-tiktok-from-government-devices\/\">Trump-era ban on it<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>According to <a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2021\/06\/03\/tiktok-just-gave-itself-permission-to-collect-biometric-data-on-u-s-users-including-faceprints-and-voiceprints\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">TechCrunch<\/a>, TikTok recently expanded its data access permissions to include gathering \u201cfaceprints and voiceprints\u201d of users. If \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.buzzfeednews.com\/article\/emilybakerwhite\/tiktok-tapes-us-user-data-china-bytedance-access\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">everything is seen in China<\/a>\u201d as members of TikTok\u2019s team have confessed in recordings, politicians such as Rubio and Warner worry that the CCP likely has access to the biometric information of millions of people around the globe. <\/p>\n<p>Rubio and Warner say that\u2019s a problem that desperately needs to be addressed by the FTC as soon as possible. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn light of repeated misrepresentations by TikTok concerning its data security, data<br \/>processing, and corporate governance practices, we urge you to act promptly on this matter,\u201d they concluded in their letter to Khan. <\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\" \/>\n<p>\n  Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire and Fox News. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Executives at ByteDance-owned TikTok likely lied to Congress about the social media company\u2019s relationship with China and how much access the communist country has to U.S. user data. When the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":490,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1542949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1542949","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/490"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1542949"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1542949\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1542949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1542949"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1542949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}