An Alleged Worry for Security
Leonel Sohns, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
TikTok’s ban was supposedly followed through to protect national safety, but is that the only reason?
On January 18, TikTok was banned at 10:30 pm EST for 12 hours. This followed a bill passed in early 2024 requiring TikTok to sell to a US company or face a shutdown. Many lost their main source of income, or an app they use daily, while others found alternatives to this sudden change, such as the Chinese app, RedNote.
“It was a bit of a spite thing—and I also wanted to be one of the first people over there,” entrepreneur Christina Shuler said in an interview with Time Magazine. “Hopefully I can be part of the crowd that maybe can change how our government views this whole situation.”
In an act of protest, many moved on to RedNote, an actual social media app that was explicitly influenced by the Chinese Communist Party. CCP influence was one of the accusations TikTok faced, while another was that American data was being sold to the Chinese government.
“Some 77% of Americans have little or no trust in leaders of social media companies to publicly admit mistakes and take responsibility for data misuse,” according to the Pew Research Center. “71% have little to no trust that these tech leaders will be held accountable by the government for data missteps.”
If the government truly cared about our safety, instead of holding only TikTok accountable, they should also have other companies, who may even steal more data, face the same charges.
“Although X and TikTok collect extensive data, their focus is more on their platforms, resulting in Meta having not only more data but more detailed and comprehensive data from across its platforms and user interactions,” according to Kiteworks, a software privacy company.
If the ban was truly focused on national security, why hasn’t the government acted on other, worse, privacy-compromising companies?
“They tell you this is about China. About security. About safety. That’s a lie,” Rand Paul said in an interview with Spectrum News. “This is about control. About fear. About silencing you.”
I agree with Paul, this ban isn’t to protect you, but instead to silence you. TikTok hasn’t shown hostile behavior when it comes to privacy, which is even confirmed by the CEO himself.
“Building what amounts to a firewall to seal off protected U.S. user data from unauthorized foreign access,” CEO Shou Zi Chew said during a congressional hearing. “The bottom line is this: American data stored on American soil, by an American company, overseen by American personnel."
The ban isn’t meant to protect your data, it’s intended to ensure your data is for, and monitored by, the US alone.