GOP lawmakers accuse TikTok of offering 'false or deceptive' information

Home Republicans are accusing TikTok of offering congressional employees with “false or deceptive” details about the app’s use of person information throughout a September briefing.

“We nonetheless have unanswered questions and also you failed to offer responsive paperwork requested by the Committee. Moreover, among the data TikTok offered in the course of the employees briefing seems to be unfaithful or deceptive, together with that TikTok doesn’t observe U.S. person places,” the lawmakers wrote in a letter dated Tuesday to TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew. 

Reps. James Comer (R-Ky.) and Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) — the rating members of the Committee on Oversight and Reform and the Committee on Vitality and Commerce, respectively — mentioned within the letter that TikTok assured lawmakers it didn’t observe customers’ web information whereas they weren’t utilizing the app and that China-based workers can’t entry U.S. person information.

“Each claims look like deceptive at greatest, and at worst, false,” the lawmakers wrote. 

Comer and Rodgers are asking the TikTok CEO to show over quite a lot of paperwork, digital data and communication associated to their considerations, with a deadline of Dec. 6.

They’re additionally asking for “all drafts and iterations” of any settlement with the Biden administration that may permit TikTok to proceed working inside the U.S.

Republican lawmakers have lengthy been taking a look at TikTok, which is owned by China-based guardian firm ByteDance, however the brand new letter could sign the social gathering is ramping up probes because it prepares to take management of the Home within the subsequent Congress. 

GOP lawmakers have mentioned they plan to probe quite a lot of subjects, together with the U.S.-Mexico border, the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Home Minority Chief Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) mentioned earlier this week he plans to kickstart a Home choose committee on China if he’s elected Speaker of the brand new, GOP-majority home, to press China on the COVID-19 pandemic. 

However concern over TikTok hasn’t been confined to the GOP, and plenty of have raised considerations about its ties to the Chinese language authorities and its utilization of U.S. person information. 

Democratic Sen. Mark Warner (Va.), chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, earlier this week known as TikTok an “huge menace” and mentioned dad and mom must be “very involved” about their kids’s use of the app.

“All of that information that your baby is inputting and receiving is being saved someplace in Beijing,” Warner mentioned.