‘TikTok is a weapon by the Chinese Communist Party to spy on you’

The listening to, which lasted for greater than 5 hours, kicked off with calls from a lawmaker to ban the app and remained combative all through. 

It provided a vivid show of the bipartisan strain on the favored short-form video app and the corporate’s uphill battle to enhance relations with Washington.

Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, opened Thursday’s listening to by tearing into TikTook.

“Your platform should be banned,” she advised Shou.

“I expect today you’ll say anything to avoid this outcome.

” … We aren’t shopping for it. In truth, while you have fun the 150 million American customers on TikTook, it emphasises the urgency for Congress to behave.

“That is 150 million Americans that the (Chinese Communist Party) can collect sensitive information on.”

In his opening remarks, Chew tried to emphasize TikTook’s independence from China and performed up its US ties.

“TikTok itself is not available in mainland China, we’re headquartered in Los Angeles and Singapore, and we have 7000 employees in the US today,” he mentioned.

“Still, we have heard important concerns about the potential for unwanted foreign access to US data and potential manipulation of the TikTok US ecosystem.

“Our strategy has by no means been to dismiss or trivialise any of those considerations. We have addressed them with actual motion.”

Chew’s moment in the hot seat comes as some lawmakers are renewing calls for the app to be banned in the US due to perceived national security concerns because of its ties to China through its parent company, ByteDance.

TikTok acknowledged to CNN last week that federal officials are demanding the app’s Chinese owners sell their stake in the social media platform, or risk facing a US ban of the app.

TikTok doesn’t operate in China.

But since the Chinese government enjoys significant leverage over businesses under its jurisdiction, the theory goes that ByteDance, and thus indirectly, TikTok, could be forced to cooperate with a broad range of security activities, including possibly the transfer of TikTok data.

With his appearance, Chew may have hoped to reassure Americans and temper the heated rhetoric in Washington about the app — but the hours-long hearing showed just how challenging a task that might be.

Washington has already made up its mind about TikTok

Much of Chew’s attempts to stress that his company is not an arm of the Chinese government appeared to fall on deaf ears. Numerous members of Congress interrupted the chief executive’s testimony to say they simply don’t believe him.

“To the American folks watching at this time, hear this: TikTook is a weapon by the Chinese Communist Party to spy on you, manipulate what you see and exploit for future generations,” McMorris Rodgers said.

In an exchange with Representative Anna Eshoo, Chew talked up TikTok’s ongoing efforts to protect US user data and said he has “seen no proof that the Chinese authorities has entry to that knowledge; they’ve by no means requested us, now we have not supplied it”.

“I discover that truly preposterous,” Eshoo fired back.

Chew responded: “I’ve regarded in — and I’ve seen no proof of this occurring. Our dedication is to maneuver their knowledge into the United States, to be saved on American soil by an American firm, overseen by American personnel. So the chance could be much like any authorities going to an American firm, asking for knowledge.”

Eshoo: “I do not consider that TikTook — that you’ve mentioned or executed something to persuade us.”

Perhaps no exchange summed up Thursday’s hearing like a moment following Representative Kat Cammack’s lengthy critique of TikTok’s content moderation and links to China.

“Can I reply, Chair?” Chew asked McMorris Rodgers after Cammack’s time was up.

McMorris Rodgers considered Chew for a brief moment.

“No. We’re going to maneuver on,” she said.

TikTok CEO stresses its practices are no different than US tech giants

As lawmakers doubled down on their questions about TikTok’s data collection practices, Chew emphasised the data TikTok collects is data “that is often collected by many different corporations in our business”.

“We are dedicated to be very clear with our customers about what we acquire,” Chew said.

“I do not consider what we acquire is greater than most gamers within the business.”

Independent researchers have backed Chew’s assertions.

In 2020, The Washington Post worked with a privacy researcher to look under the hood at TikTok, concluding that the app does not appear to collect any more data than your typical mainstream social network.

The following year, Pellaeon Lin, a Taiwan-based researcher at the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab, performed another technical analysis that reached similar conclusions.

Still, even if TikTok collects about the same amount of information as Facebook or Twitter, that’s still quite a lot of data, including information about the videos you watch, comments you write, private messages you send, and — if you agree to grant this level of access — your exact geolocation and contact lists.

TikTok’s impact on children a key point of focus

While national security was expected to be the primary focus of the hearing, multiple lawmakers also highlighted concerns about TikTok’s impact on children.

Democratic ranking member of the committee Representative Frank Pallone, for example, said Thursday: “Research has discovered that TikTook’s algorithms suggest movies to teenagers that create and exacerbate emotions of emotional misery, together with movies selling suicide, self-harm and consuming problems.”

Representative Bob Latta, a Republican from Ohio, accused TikTok of promoting a video on the so-called “blackout problem” or choking challenge to the feed of a 10-year-old girl from Pennsylvania, who later died after trying to mimic the challenge in the video.

Republican Representative Gus Bilirakis of Florida also said there is a lack of adequate content moderation, which leaves room for kids to be exposed to content that promotes self-harm.

“Your know-how is actually resulting in dying,” Bilirakis said to Chew.

“It is unacceptable, sir, that even after figuring out all these risks, you continue to declare that TikTook is one thing grand to behold,” he said, citing examples of harmful content served to children.

TikTok, for its parts, has launched a number of features in recent months to provide additional safeguards for younger users, including setting a new 60-minute default for daily time limit for those under the age of 18.

Even that feature, however, was criticised by lawmakers as being too easy for teens to bypass.

Lawmaker compares Chew to Zuckerberg

Representative Tony Cárdenas, a Democrat from California, blasted what he saw as Chew’s indirect responses and compared him to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who in his own testimonies in the past has also frustrated some members of Congress.

“You have been one of many few folks to unite this committee,” Cárdenas told Chew.

“You remind me quite a lot of Mark Zuckerberg. When he got here right here, I mentioned to my employees, ‘He jogs my memory of Fred Astaire — good dancer with phrases’.

“And you are doing the same today. A lot of your answers are a bit nebulous; they’re not yes or no.”

Zuckerberg testified earlier than the identical home committee for hours again in 2018 within the wake of the Cambridge Analytica knowledge scandal.

While each Chew and Zuckerberg lead main social media platforms, Zuckerberg was already a family identify when he confronted lawmakers again in 2018.

Chew, in the meantime, has largely stayed out of the highlight since he took the helm of TikTook again in 2021.

TikTook personnel have labored to sharpen and polish Chew’s presentation throughout these classes.

They have performed the roles of lawmakers with varied questioning types, peppering Chew with follow queries and situations to prepared him for hours of relentless interrogation.

Federal authorities ratchets up its rhetoric

Outside the listening to room, federal officers appeared to ramp up their rhetoric in regards to the destiny of TikTook within the United States.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken mentioned TikTook must be “ended one way or another” however famous “there are different ways of doing that”.

Speaking at a separate House Foreign Affairs Committee listening to, Blinken mentioned he didn’t know if it might be adequate for TikTook to be divested from its Chinese father or mother firm.

The prime US diplomat mentioned he believed the app is a menace to US nationwide safety, however wouldn’t outright say that it must be banned.

“Clearly, we, the administration and others are seized with the challenge that it poses and are taking action to address it,” he mentioned.

In a separate assertion on Thursday that didn’t tackle or identify TikTook particularly, the US Treasury Department — the company that chairs the Committee on Foreign Investments within the United States — warned it “will not clear any transaction unless it determines there are no unresolved national security concerns”.

“Broadly speaking, some transactions can present data security risks — including providing a foreign person or government with access to troves of Americans’ sensitive personal data as well as access to intellectual property, source code, or other potentially sensitive information,” a Department spokesperson mentioned.

“CFIUS, on a case-by-case basis, will ensure the protection of national security, including to prevent the misuse of data through espionage, tracking, and other means that threaten national security.”

For greater than two years, CFIUS and TikTook have been negotiating on a attainable deal which may tackle US safety considerations and permit the app to proceed working within the United States.

But in his testimony, Chew tried to ease the longstanding considerations in regards to the app and referred to as the fears of Chinese authorities entry to TikTook’s person knowledge “hypothetical”.

“I think a lot of risks that are pointed out are hypothetical and theoretical risks,” Chew mentioned.

“I have not seen any evidence. I am eagerly awaiting discussions where we can talk about evidence and then we can address the concerns that are being raised.”