John Ndlovu
Information and Technology Reporter
The United States of America spy Agency has accused the Chinese developed TikTok of being a threat to State Security.
TikTok, known in China as Douyin is a short-form video hosting service owned by Chinese company ByteDance.
It hosts a variety of user-submitted videos, from content such as pranks, stunts, tricks, jokes and dance, with duration from 15 seconds to ten minutes.
While the application has been widely used for
pranks, stunts, tricks, jokes and dance it was actually developed as an educational communication tool.
Now the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) has accused TikTok as a Chinese spy tool.
FBI director Chris Wray claimed that TikTok on seriously undermines state security.
The FBI boss expressed concerns on the United States of America’s national security as he claimed that TikTok used it’s data for spying purposes.
Byte Dance, TikTok maker, is blamed for using data for espionage operations, which is an act of or process of learning secret information through secretive (clandestine) means.
The FBI’s claims therefore further thaws the two countries’ relations which have been quite icy over the years. The Asian nation has been a bogey side for the Western nation which has led the USA to effect stringent trade measures on the Asian giant.
Addressing an audience at the University of Michigan’s Gerald R. Ford School Public Policy, Wray expressed his concerns over China’s ability to control the algorithms of TikTok which was viewed as worrisome on national security as the later (China) could use information obtained from TikTok for espionage operations which would seriously undermine US’ state security.
TikTok application is a short form video hosting service which has become one of the most popular used computer and mostly cellphone application and is estimated to have around one billion active users in over 153 countries worldwide.
Wray said his fears emanate from the fact that China has capabilities of using the video application to manipulate content which may seriously undermine state security since it is able to access data.
“The algorithm recommendations give China capabilities and power to manipulate content and even to use it for influential operations.” Said Wray
Wray further expressed that the Asian based company collect user data for traditional espionage operations, which will seriously undermine state security as information will be at the wrong hands.
“All of these things are in the hands of a government that doesn’t share our values and that has a mission that is very much at odds with what is in the best interest of the United States.”
Back in August 2020, former US Head of State Donald Trump brought in stern measures in a bid to curb such acts by the short video company through setting a deadline for the TikTok to find a US buyer and also threatened banning it if it failed to comply within 45 days.
In 2021, President Joe Biden revoked his predecessor’s administration ban after signing an executive order which called for Commerce Secretary Ginah Raimondo to investigate applications connected to foreign companies.
TikTok started in June rolling out routing American users’ data via United States based servers owned by Oracle. However, Buzzfeed News reported that US user data was still repeatedly accessed from the Asian nation.
TikTok spokesperson responded to Wray’s comments as he assured on working to fully satisfy and bring solutions to US national security concerns.
“As Director Wray has previously said, the FBI’s input is being considered as part of our ongoing negotiations with the US government while we cannot comment on the specifics of those confidential discussions, we are confident that we are on a path to fully satisfy all reasonable US national security concerns and have already made significant strides towards implementing those solutions.”
Chinese and United States governments have had stiff wars both on foreign policies and economic battles which has seen Beijing spreading it’s wings to third world countries such as Zimbabwe, South Africa, Nigeria and Botswana. Most of the countries which were placed under economic sanctions by the Western giant.