Member FCC asks Google and Apple to remove TikTok from app stores

A member of the US Federal Communications Commission has publicly requested that Google and Apple remove TikTok from their respective app stores. He does not speak directly on behalf of the inspection body and therefore seems to be acting on his own.

The appropriate FCC commissioner Brendan Carr claims that the social medium collects huge amounts of data and forwards it to ‘Beijing’, referring to TikTok parent company ByteDance. He bases his opinion on one article from Buzzfeed News citing secret audio recordings and statements from several TikTok employees; indeed, private data of American users could be viewed by ByteDance.

Although the extent of the privacy problem surrounding TikTok is still hardly known, the company previously assured that all data exchange takes place via American servers of the Oracle company. The platform says it meets the requirements of the Americans. That plan, on the other hand, has already encountered criticism under President Trump’s administration. The same privacy measure was also introduced in Europe earlier this year.

Roughly a year ago, President Biden reversed the decree issued by predecessor Trump. There have also been several official investigations into the platform, but so far no reason has emerged to ban the application completely from the Google and Apple app stores in the United States. However, TikTok is no longer allowed on devices of employees of the army and other national security organizations.

Update, Thursday: Buzzfeed was incorrectly referenced as the basis of Brendan Carr’s argument, but it was supposed to be Buzzfeed News. The medium falls under the Buzzfeed umbrella, but usually takes drastically different angles than the parent company.