(London) The Chinese application TikTok suffered further setbacks on Tuesday, both in Australia, where members of the government will no longer have the right to use it on their professional devices, and in the United Kingdom, which has imposed a fine for breaches of the protection of children’s data.
Australia is the latest country in the so-called Five Eyes alliance to ban members of its government from TikTok, following the US, UK, Canada and New Zealand.
Australia is the latest country in the so-called Five Eyes alliance to ban members of its government from TikTok, following the US, UK, Canada and New Zealand.
The United States notably accuses TikTok, a subsidiary of the Chinese group ByteDance, of serving as a tool for Beijing to spy on and manipulate Americans.
Mr. Dreyfus said waivers could be granted on a “case-by-case basis” and subject to “appropriate security measures”.
The decision in Australia was made on the advice of Australian intelligence services and will be put into practice “as soon as possible”, Australian Justice Minister Mark Dreyfus said.
Similar measures have been taken in France, the Netherlands and by the European Commission.
Mr. Dreyfus said waivers could be granted on a “case-by-case basis” and subject to “appropriate security measures”.
Studies have estimated that seven million Australians use the app, around a quarter of the population.
In a security advisory on the ban, the Department of Justice says TikTok poses “significant security and privacy risks” due to “massive collection of user data.”
China says it has officially protested to Canberra.
“We call on the Australian side to sincerely abide by the rules of market economy and the principles of fair competition, and provide Chinese enterprises with a fair, transparent and non-discriminatory business environment,” said Mao Ning, a spokesperson. speech of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, during a press conference.
At the center of fears is a 2017 Chinese law that requires local companies to hand over personal data that would be relevant to national security upon request from the authorities.
Beijing maintains that this law poses no threat to ordinary users.
TikTok nevertheless admitted in November that some employees in China could access European user data, and admitted in December that employees had used this data to stalk journalists.
TikTok says the bans on it are “rooted in xenophobia,” and claims it is neither owned nor dependent on the Chinese state.
The company’s Australian spokesperson, Lee Hunter, said TikTok would “never” hand over any data to the Chinese government.
TikTok nevertheless admitted in November that some employees in China could access European user data, and admitted in December that employees had used this data to stalk journalists.
TikTok is owned by Chinese group ByteDance, which has a similar but separate app for China.
The short video sharing app has over 1 billion active users worldwide. It is particularly popular with young people.
On Tuesday, the social network was fined 12.7 million pounds (14, €5 million).
The ICO, the British digital data supervisory authority, estimates that TikTok enabled up to 1.4 million children under the age of 13 in the United Kingdom to open an account on its platform in 2020. , contrary to its own official rules.
The regulator also points to the use of their data without the consent of their parents.
The ICO investigation found that TikTok failed to conduct “adequate checks to identify and cancel accounts of underage children” even as some executives raised concerns about internal on this subject, details the ICO in a press release.
“There are laws in place in the UK to make sure our children are safe in the digital world” and “TikTok has not followed them,” commented UK Information Commissioner John Edwards. in the press release.
TikTok says it is investing “heavily” to keep under-13s off its platform. He says he “disagrees” with the British fine and studies his response to this sanction.