TikTok has been banned on House of Representative-issued devices.
Catherine Szpindor, the chief administrative officer of the American legislative chamber ruled that the video-sharing app must be deleted from electronics given out by the Congressional chamber amid growing political pressure on Chinese-based social media company, Bytedance. In August, Catherine’s office ruled the platform provided a “high risk to users”.
The recent ruling from the CAO was shared by NBC News, which was a memo that read: “House staff are NOT allowed to download the TikTok app on any House mobile devices. If you have the TikTok app on your House mobile device, you will be contacted to remove it.”
The US House of Representative confirmed the ban, saying in a statement: “We can confirm that the Committee on House Administration has authorized the CAO Office of Cybersecurity to initiate the removal of TikTok Social Media Service from all House-managed devices.”
The summer “cyber advisory” came with a justification citing concerns over TikTok’s “lack of transparency in how it protects customer data” and claimed it “actively harvests content for identifiable data” and holds some users data in China, an allegation that the social media company refutes, arguing it stored in the United States and Singapore.
This ban comes amid other attempts to limit the use of TikTok by state and government employees such as the recent $1.7 trillion spending bill, which has a ban on government devices having the TikTok app.
Marco Rubio, a former presidential nominee contender for the Republican party and current Senator for Florida, has ruled it apt to "ban Beijing-controlled TikTok for good”.
