NDIS (National Disability Insurance Scheme) Minister Bill Shorten has raised concerns about the impact of social media giant TikTok on Australian children amid rising calls for the government to ban the popular video app.
During an interview with 9 News, Minister Shorten stated that the federal Labor government would not implement a total ban on the Beijing-based TikTok.
“What we have done is that for government phones, for sensitive government phones, we’re not going to use the app. So, we‘ll just take the advice of the professionals, and we’ll take it step by step.”
While the minister was concerned about TikTok’s security issues, he said there was a need to scrutinise the impact of the app on children.
“As a parent, I think there’s a separate discussion to be had about the impact of social media on kids in particular,” he said.
“The algorithms that these programs use, I think, do have an injuring effect on kids … I’m not a fan of TikTok at all, but in terms of national security, we'll take the advice of the national security experts.”
Meanwhile, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has urged the Labor government to step up its action against TikTok.
Nevertheless, Mr. Dutton did not call for an outright ban of the app, saying it would depend on the advice national security chiefs provide to the government.
“If they’re saying, look, prime minister, we’ve got a real problem here because young kids [and] Australians of all ages are using TikTok, and their personal information is being mined, the images are being captured, and Australians are having their devices exploited, then the prime minister has got a responsibility to step up and do the right thing by Australians,” he said.
US House of Representatives Passes Bill That Could Ban TikTok
Mr. Shorten’s statement comes just a day after he U.S. House of Representatives passed a piece of legislation that could ban TikTok from the United States and grant the president new authorities to target foreign companies in the country.Under the bill, TikTok will be required to divest from its China-based parent company, ByteDance, or be banned from U.S. app stores and hosting services.
At the same time, it would allow the U.S. president to force the divestiture of any social media company that is based in China, Iran, North Korea, or Russia and has more than a million users if they are deemed as hazards to national security.
President Joe Biden has pledged to sign the legislation into law if it passes the Senate.
