Following the lead of Europe, The United States and Canada moved forward on Monday, February 27, and banned Beijing-based ByteDance Ltd. TikTok on all government-issued devices.
Citing risk to privacy and security, Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that TikTok’s prohibition could “serve as a signal to the wider population.”
“I suspect that as the government takes the significant step of telling all federal employees that they can no longer use TikTok on their work phones, many Canadians from business to private individuals will reflect on the security of their data and perhaps make choices,” Trudeau said.
The White House, however, gave federal agencies 30 days to eliminate the use of the popular social media app, implementing a ban approved by Congress last December.
The European Commission and the EU Council banned TikTok on staff phones last week.
Before that, European lawmakers and officials have expressed concern that Beijing could force TikTok to hand over data on its users or to influence the videos they view.
Discussion about this post