TikTok is dangerous – a drug, subversive and spyware

TikTok is dangerous. That is why the US, European Union and Australian governments have banned TikTok on government devices. Britain is under pressure to follow suit as Western countries all fear TikTok’s social and political impacts on their countries.

Let’s address the security concerns first. Neither the EU nor US governments are prone to irrationally banning Apps. There is sufficient proof that user data could be accessible to the Chinese Communist Party on demand. Assurances otherwise from TikTok local offices have not been enough to get the ban lifted.

The EU Commission’s Corporate Management Board has decided to suspend the use of the TikTok application on its corporate devices, and personal devices enrolled in the Commission’s mobile device service to increase its cybersecurity.
EU spokesperson

TikTok is dangerous – A drug – all social media is

The UK Government and politicians widely use TikTok because it is free, easy to use and effective. In many ways, that is like an addictive drug – once hooked, you are the product to exploit.

Alicia Kearns, the chair of the UK Commons foreign affairs committee, told the Guardian: “We’ve now seen both the EU and the US take decisive action on TikTok over security concerns: the acquisition of our personal data by a hostile state. We risk becoming a tech security laggard amongst free and open nations.

The government needs to reconsider its policies and move to ban government officials and parliamentary staff from installing the app on any mobile phones utilised for work. We need an informed discussion across our country, including with our children, about the importance of our data and all it can reveal about us and how it can make us vulnerable.

Tim Loughton, the Conservative MP for East Worthing and Shoreham, urged the prime minister to take ‘concerted action’ against Chinese state threats. He said TikTok was a ‘mega state-affiliated data harvesting organisation’ that the UK should not deal with on an equivalent basis to other western multinational companies.

The former Conservative leader Iain Duncan Smith added:

Even when their western security operatives show that TikTok poses a security risk to us in the UK, we seem to drag our feet, trying not to take action that might upset China.