TikTok Likely To Face Ban In US; FCC Writes To Apple, Google To Bar Video Platform

TikTok is a popular video platform, no doubt. However, it's been under continuous scrutiny for a while now. While TikTok is banned in India, it might soon face a similar situation in the US too. In the latest news, FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr has requested Apple and Google to remove the TikTok app from their respective platforms.

TikTok Ban Continues

Currently, you can't download TikTok from either Apple App Store or the Google Play Store in India since it was banned in 2020. In the latest development, a similar situation might arrive for TikTok in the US market too. FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr wrote to Apple and Google, requesting them to remove TikTok from their platforms.

The reason is "its pattern of surreptitious data practices." Reports of TikTok staff in China accessing US-based user data have been doing rounds for a while now. "As you know TikTok is an app that is available to millions of Americans through your app stores, and it collects vast troves of sensitive data about those US users," the letter said.

TikTok is owned by ByteDance, a Chinese firm that naturally has to comply with Chinese law. "It is clear that TikTok poses an unacceptable national security risk due to its extensive data harvesting being combined with Beijing's apparently unchecked access to that sensitive data," the letter further stated.

TikTok is not just another video app.
That’s the sheep’s clothing.

It harvests swaths of sensitive data that new reports show are being accessed in Beijing.

I’ve called on @Apple & @Google to remove TikTok from their app stores for its pattern of surreptitious data practices. pic.twitter.com/Le01fBpNjn

— Brendan Carr (@BrendanCarrFCC) June 28, 2022

TikTok Rubbishes Reports

When earlier reports of data practices were reported, TikTok quickly went into defense. The ByteDance-owned company said it was moving all US users' data to Oracle servers within the US borders and would use US and Singapore-based servers for backup.

TikTok also said it would "delete U.S. users' private data from our own data centers and fully pivot to Oracle cloud servers located in the U.S." TikTok also said it would bring in US-based leadership to manage the US userbase.

This isn't the first time that TikTok has come under the radar. The previous president Donald Trump had also raised questions about the short-form video app and its relations with China. Presently, TikTok is working on re-entering India in the form of ByteDance. However, nothing has been confirmed yet.