Banning TikTok Will Not Ensure Data Privacy in the United States.
New regulations on social media and data protection will be implemented.
On January 10, 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court will make a crucial decision regarding the future of TikTok in the country, considering the possibility of banning the popular video-sharing app. In April 2024, outgoing President Joe Biden signed a foreign aid bill that gives ByteDance, TikTok's parent company, a nine-month deadline to divest its U.S. operations or face a ban. This deadline is set to expire on January 20, although it could be extended.
Among the main reasons for opposition to TikTok are child protection, national security, foreign influence, and data privacy. U.S. lawmakers are particularly concerned about Chinese control over a platform with approximately 170 million active users in the country. However, banning TikTok would not resolve the data privacy issues faced by Americans.
It is important to highlight that TikTok is not the only online platform that poses risks to the privacy of American users' data. The app is known for its invasive privacy policy; those who register must provide a substantial amount of personal information, such as name, age, email address, and profile picture, along with details about their activities on the app.
Paradoxically, this situation is not exclusive to TikTok. Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and WhatsApp, operates similarly and on a much larger scale, accumulating nearly 4 billion active users in the U.S. by the end of 2023. This raises the question of whether Chinese ownership of TikTok really increases the risk of American data falling into foreign government hands.
Alarm intensified in late 2022 when four ByteDance employees were fired for illegally accessing data of American journalists, including the locations of their IP addresses, which created a consensus that TikTok poses a national security threat and prompted a ban on the use of the app on government devices.
Nevertheless, American companies are not immune to privacy incidents either. Past scandals, such as the Cambridge Analytica case in 2018, where data from 87 million Facebook users was mishandled, demonstrate that Americans' data may not be any safer in the hands of local firms. Moreover, recent cyberattacks, such as the Salt Typhoon incident that affected major U.S. telecommunications, underscore the vulnerability of data security in the country.
Despite these legitimate concerns about TikTok, the solution does not simply lie in banning the app. Instead, stricter regulations on data protection are needed, along with greater clarity in the obligations of large tech companies concerning their social impact. While the European Union moves forward with innovative legislation like the GDPR and the Digital Services Act, the U.S. still lacks comprehensive federal data privacy legislation.
Recent research shows a significant lack of balance in data protection across different U.S. states, with initiatives such as the American Privacy Rights Act being proposed but not making significant progress. As legislative priorities may change with a new administration, a TikTok ban could create more problems in terms of civil rights, such as freedom of expression and access to information, rather than effective solutions.
U.S. officials should focus on addressing the fundamental issues related to surveillance-based business models instead of imposing arbitrary bans. As Lauren Armistead, Deputy Director of Amnesty Tech, stated, it is crucial to introduce regulations that address all tech platforms to effectively protect human rights in the digital age.