US senators urges for a security probe into Chinese app TikTok

US Senators Chuck Schumer and  Tom Cotton on October 23 urged the intelligence officials to conduct an investigation whether the popular Chinese owned app TikTok poses a risk to national security. The senators raised concerns by writing a letter to the acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Macguire about the popular video-sharing app's collection of user data and whether China censors content seen by U.S. users.

READ: BJP's TikTok Star Sonali Phogat Loses Adampur, Blames Booth Capturing

TikTok poses security threats: Senators

They noted that TikTok collects a good amount of personal data from users resulting in an indirect security risk. TikTok is very famous worldwide with over 500 million users in the past two years. There is a growing concern in the US about security and censorship issues involving TikTok which is owned by ByteDance, a Beijing based tech company, and other China-owned content platforms. US senator Marco Rubio has asked the concerned authorities to review allegations that the Chinese government uses TikTok for political censorship. They said that the app has been downloaded with over 110 million in the US alone and poses an intelligence threat that cannot be ignored. They have urged the investigators to look into the matter of TikTok’s collection of users’ location-related data and other confidential personal information.

READ:TikTok Star Hareem Shah's Videos Inside Pak Foreign Office Create Stir

TikTok says it is not influenced by any foreign government

The senators have warned that it could potentially influence voters' in next year's election in the same way Russians manipulated US social media in the 2016 campaign. They acknowledged that TikTok does not operate in China where ByteDance offers a similar but separate DouYin app and pointed out that TikTok's user data is stored inside the US. Tiktok is blocked in China and not available in Chinese app stores. Users of mainland China has complained that they are unable to log into the app using their registered mobile numbers.TikTok published a statement on its website on Friday saying that the video-sharing platform is not influenced by any other foreign government including China.

READ: Haryana: TikTok Sensation Sonali Phogat Confident Of Adampur Victory

READ: TikTok Removes Propaganda Videos From The App To Fight Terrorism

(With inputs from agencies)