Republican leaders are increasing the pressure on TikTok over the possibility that China is able to access its American data.
Reps. James Comer (R-KY) and Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA) sent a letter on Thursday to TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew requesting documents addressing whether China-based employees of TikTok’s parent company ByteDance have access to United States user data.
“We write to request documents and information regarding recent reports that TikTok allows China-based employees of its parent company, ByteDance, to access non-public U.S. user data, contrary to the company’s prior denials,” the representatives said in the letter. Comer currently serves as a ranking member of the Oversight Committee, while Rodgers is a ranking member of the Energy and Commerce Committee.
TIKTOK DEFENDS OWNERSHIP, CLAIMS CHINESE COMPANY JUST HAS 1% STAKE
NEW: Congressional leaders on House Oversight and Commerce Committees, @RepJamesComer & @cathymcmorris , are taking action on #TikTok—including sending TikTok a broad set of document requests today on the flow of sensitive U.S. user date into China. pic.twitter.com/I1AY2imrHJ
— Brendan Carr (@BrendanCarrFCC) July 14, 2022
“If true, not only did TikTok misrepresent or provide false testimony about its data management and security practices, but it has placed the safety and privacy of millions of U.S. citizens at risk,” the letter added.
Rodgers and Comer requested that TikTok elaborate on the number of Chinese employees who have access, how it intends to move data from U.S. servers to Chinese servers, and what the company’s position is on its relationship with China’s national intelligence law. The law, passed in 2017, would require companies based in China to oblige with requests for information from the country’s intelligence agencies.
The letter is the latest request from Congress after a Buzzfeed News report revealed that the company’s Chinese employees were able to access U.S. user data. Nine Republican senators sent a letter to Chew on June 28, requesting answers regarding its relationship with China.
Chew responded to the letter by confirming that China-based employees could access U.S. data, albeit through a preset number of security precautions. The TikTok CEO also stated that all U.S. user data are being transferred to servers run by the U.S. cloud hosting service Oracle, a change announced on the same day as the Buzzfeed report. He also said that the Chinese Communist Party had never asked for U.S. user data and that TikTok has never provided said data to the CCP, nor would it do so if the party asked for it.
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Sens. Mark Warner (D-VA) and Marco Rubio (R-FL) requested on July 6 that the Federal Trade Commission investigate TikTok’s data security practices.
The company was also defensive on Wednesday after a House Oversight Committee hearing questioned the company and asserted that the CCP has an ownership stake in ByteDance. The company responded by noting that the CCP had a 1% share in the ByteDance subsidiary Beijing Douyin Information Service Limited, not in ByteDance itself.
