Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) introduced on Jan. 25 the “No TikTok on United States Devices Act” to prohibit the Chinese-based app from being downloaded on all U.S. devices and ban commercial transactions with ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company.
Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.) has introduced companion legislation in the House.
“TikTok is a clear threat to our privacy and national security,” Buck said in a statement. “Not only is TikTok directly associated with the Chinese Communist Party, but it has been used to spy on Americans and gain an alarming level of access to users’ phones.
“This should concern every citizen who values their privacy, security, and personal information. Banning CCP-tied TikTok nationwide is the only route to ending this malicious cybersecurity threat.”
He said the legislation, if passed, will “ensure that every Americans’ privacy and security is protected from hostile foreign entities.”
If the legislation is signed into law, within 120 days, the director of national intelligence is required to submit a report and update Congress on TikTok’s threat to national security.
This would include reporting on how the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) can access U.S. user data; how it can use such data for intelligence or military purposes, which could include surveillance, microtargeting, deepfakes, or blackmail; and ongoing efforts by the CCP to monitor or manipulate Americans through the use of the data accessed via TikTok.
TikTok has long been the subject of congressional scrutiny due to its ties to the CCP and its practice of sending user data to ByteDance employees located in China.
CCP laws classify data as a national resource and mandate that companies located in China or majority-owned by Chinese entities must hand over all data to the regime upon request, including proprietary source code and other intellectual property.
While TikTok has previously stated that all U.S. user data is stored within the United States, it has since admitted that this isn’t true. In a September 2022 congressional hearing, TikTok executives refused to commit to stopping the flow of American data to China.
Federal Communications Commission member Brendan Carr in early November 2022 said TikTok should be banned from the United States entirely, saying that it’s impossible for U.S. officials to confirm that the CCP doesn’t have access to TikTok users’ data.
TikTok rose in popularity in the United States in 2017, after ByteDance acquired Chinese-owned social media company Musical.ly and paired its Santa Monica office with TikTok.
“There are many red flags, but the biggest red flag about this acquisition is that TikTok did not notify the U.S. government about the acquisition,” Cain said. “That should sound alarm bells. Why did TikTok decide not to do that review? It’s as if they kind of snuck into the market and placed their software in the hands of the next generation.”
