Gareth Corfield
Fri, 23 June 2023
TikTok China
TikTok has admitted that some of its US users’ data is stored in China, despite previously suggesting it was all on servers within America.
The Chinese-owned company, which is one of the world’s fastest-growing social media apps, admitted in a letter on Thursday that “certain creator data” is stored in China.
The revelation comes after intense public scrutiny of TikTok on both sides of the Atlantic amid national security fears over its ownership by China’s ByteDance.
TikTok said in a letter that it defined creators as users “who enter into a commercial relationship” with it such as influencers who make paid content for the video streaming app.
Those people’s contracts and “related documents” are held outside the US, the company said in a letter to two US senators.
Information on creators such as tax forms and social security numbers are stored in China, Forbes magazine reported on Thursday, citing internal sources.
A company spokesman said: “TikTok has not been asked for this data by the Chinese government or the [Chinese Communist Party]. TikTok has not provided such data to the Chinese government or CCP, nor would TikTok do so.”
Fears over Chinese government access to data have arisen because of the country’s national security laws, which allow any Chinese company to be forced to spy on its customers at the request of local authorities.
US senators Marsha Blackburn and Richard Blumenthal said in a statement: “We are extremely concerned that TikTok is storing Americans’ personal, private data within the reach of the Chinese government.
“TikTok’s response makes it crystal clear that Americans’ data is still exposed to Beijing’s draconian and pervasive spying regimes – despite the claims of TikTok’s misleading public relations campaign.”
Western governments fear that data gathered by TikTok from their citizens’ devices can be sifted through at will by Chinese agents looking for valuable targets to spy on.
Earlier this year, TikTok was banned from British government officials’ devices, with former Conservative Party leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith calling the app a “Chinese government data harvester”.
Similarly, foreign affairs committee chairman Alicia Kearns, who is subject to Chinese sanctions for speaking out about the country’s human rights abuses, has warned that TikTok could let Beijing “capitalise on our vulnerabilities”.
TikTok has repeatedly insisted it is not working with Beijing.
A lawsuit was launched by TikTok in May to stop the US state of Montana banning anyone from installing the app on their personal phones.
The unprecedented ban, which is currently set to come into force next year, breaches Americans’ rights to freedom of speech, according to TikTok’s legal filings. TikTok said recent bans were based on “misguided and based on fundamental misconceptions”.
Five influencers have also sued, saying Governor Greg Gianforte’s prohibition on TikTok is an unlawful “prior restraint on expression that violates the First Amendment” of the US constitution.
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