The European Commission has banned its employees from using the Chinese social media app TikTok, citing security concerns.
The European Union has banned the popular Chinese video-sharing app TikTok from its employees’ mobile devices, citing security concerns. Developed by Chinese company ByteDance, the app has over 1 billion active users worldwide and is under scrutiny in the US and other countries over suspected links to the Beijing government.
The US has already warned of alleged links between the Chinese company and the Communist Party, accusing TikTok of collecting and sharing data for Chinese intelligence.
A senior official told Politico All employees were officially ordered to remove popular apps from their devices Thursday morning. I was also instructed to remove the app from my personal device by March 15th if I was using it for work.
An alternative for employees is to delete work-related apps from their personal phones if they want to continue using TikTok.
“To protect the Commission’s data and enhance cybersecurity, the EC Corporate Management Board has decided to discontinue the TikTok application on corporate and personal devices registered to the Commission’s mobile device service,” an email to staff Thursday morning said. said.
“The reason this decision was made… is to enhance the Commission’s cybersecurity.” Committee Spokeswoman Sonya Gospodinova said at a press briefing in Brussels.. “The measure also aims to protect the Commission from cybersecurity threats and measures that could be exploited for cyberattacks on the Commission’s corporate environment.”
The U.S. government has adopted a similar measure to ban the use of TikTok on all government devices by the end of February 2023 due to national security concerns related to TikTok’s relationship with China.
TikTok has yet to comment on the decision.
January 2020 US Army prohibition For security reasons, using the popular TikTok app on employees’ phones.
November Short-form video sharing service update that privacy policy European Economic Area (“EEA”), the United Kingdom, and Switzerland, and confirmed that its employees, including Chinese employees, have access to user data.
European user data is accessible to TikTok employees in Brazil, Canada, and Israel, as well as the United States and Singapore, where user data is currently stored.
In December, TikTok parent company ByteDance revealed that several employees accessed the TikTok data of two journalists to investigate a case in which company information was leaked to the press.
According to emails from ByteDance’s legal counsel, Erich Andersen, seen by AFP, the Chinese company was trying to find out who shared company information with the Financial Times reporter and former BuzzFeed reporter.
The company fired, but did not name, the employee involved in the data breach for violating the company’s code of conduct.
Chinese employees analyzed their IP addresses to determine the location of the unfaithful employees, but this was a rough method.
While Western governments are banning the app from government devices, the company has announced plans to open two more European data centers to mitigate data privacy and security concerns.
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(security work – Hacking, EU Commission)
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