TikTok Banned From Official Devices Of The House Of Representatives

Image of a girl pointing at her phone with the TikTok app open.

Recently, the US government is not very happy with TikTok.

The US government's campaign against China's TikTok has reached new heights. After passing legislation to ban TikTok on devices used by government agencies, the US House of Representatives banned its members and employees from using TikTok on authorized devices.

In an email on Tuesday, the Home Office's Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) told officials and staff that TikTok is now banned from official devices, saying the app has been classified as "high risk" due to a number of security issues, Reuters reported. . The CAO, the neutral bureau in charge of DPR operations such as logistics and technical support, then instructed email recipients to remove TikTok from their official devices.

"Home workers are NOT allowed to download the TikTok app to mobile devices in any home," chief executive Kathryn Spindor wrote in an email, according to a copy obtained by Gizmodo. “Tik Tok is NOT allowed on House mobile devices. If you have the TikTok app installed on your mobile device, you will be prompted to uninstall it.

App downloads will also be banned in the future. Any subsequent applications or services provided by ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, are also prohibited.

A CAO spokesperson told Gizmodo early Wednesday that the policy does not apply to personal devices, but only to authorized home devices.

The CAO email comes just days after the House of Representatives passed a $1.66 trillion public funding bill, also known as the Consolidation Act, which will now go before President Joe Biden for his signature. . The omnibus bill includes a ban on TikTok on devices used by top tier agencies. Following its approval, the House Administrative Committee, chaired by California Senator Zoe Lofgren, authorized the CAO to implement a similar policy for the House of Representatives, the CAO said in an email.

The TikTok House ban is the latest example of the US government's suspicions of TikTok's parent company ByteDance, which came under fire last week after it was revealed that four of the company's employees had accessed US journalists' TikTok data to detect leaks.

State and federal lawmakers believe that TikTok is collecting information about Americans for nefarious purposes. Nineteen states have partially banned TikTok on government devices. TikTok denies the allegations and is trying to allay the concerns by storing US users' data on Oracle servers in the US.

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