TikTok Downplays China Connection In Replace To Congressional Testimony, Regardless of Latest Revelations
Fashionable video platform TikTok despatched a letter to lawmakers and downplayed its ties to China, regardless of latest media experiences which have challenged these claims.
TikTok despatched the letter in response to a whole lot of follow-up questions from lawmakers following TikTok CEO Shou Chew’s testimony in March. TikTok acknowledged having workers primarily based in China however minimized its significance regardless of latest reporting and investigations from The Wall Road Journal and Forbes which have revealed lists the corporate and its Beijing-based dad or mum ByteDance have created which might be allegedly used for censorship and information assortment.
Final 12 months, Forbes revealed that ByteDance had spied on Forbes’ journalist Emily Baker White, who lined TikTok for the publication. TikTok’s letter to lawmakers claims the spying was an unbiased motion undertaken by members of IARC (Inside Audit and Threat Management) who utilized new strategies together with “accessing or making an attempt to entry TikTok consumer information” to search out out if there have been ties between Baker-White and workers on the firm. (RELATED: TikTok Continues Censorship Of Assume Tank’s Account Selling Anti-CCP Documentary)
TikTok now describes these steps as a “misguided effort.” Throughout Chew’s testimony in March, he disagreed with the characterization that it was “spying” and even “surveillance.” The corporate says an outdoor counsel led an investigation and found workers “accessed Baker-White’s IP handle, amongst different info.”
“In his function as CEO, Mr. Chew has not interacted with the Chinese language authorities concerning TikTok,” based on the letter.
TikTok had entry to an inventory of customers who had been watching LGBT-related movies on the platform for a 12 months or extra, based on former workers who spoke to The WSJ. TikTok reportedly restricted entry to the consumer info in 2021 earlier than deleting it totally in 2022, however it’s nonetheless accessible to the corporate’s subsidiary that manages U.S. information, based on The WSJ.
Kevin Mayer, co-CEO and founding father of Candle Media and former CEO of TikTok, speaks in the course of the Milken Institute International Convention in Beverly Hills, California, on Could 1, 2023. (Photograph by PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP by way of Getty Photographs)
ByteDance has workers in China that use a moderation system together with phrase lists designed to establish or limit content material associated to subjects comparable to former President Donald Trump and the persecuted Chinese language Uyghurs, in accordance to Forbes. Over 50 lists include the time period “TikTok” of their title, however the firm instructed Forbes they’ve by no means enforced the lists on their platform.
ByteDance may additionally be monitoring on-line conversations concerning the COVID-19 lab leak idea throughout firm platforms, based on paperwork obtained in an investigation by Forbes and printed on Could 5. One “delicate phrases” record the outlet printed was known as “science and drugs” and appeared to confer with the origin of the pandemic, together with phrases comparable to “pangolin” and “leaked experiment.”
TikTok denied the corporate ever utilized these phrase lists to censor on the platform, based on Forbes. “We imagine many of those record titles have translation errors and are usually not related to TikTok,” TikTok spokesperson Jamie Favazza instructed the outlet.
TikTok and ByteDance didn’t instantly reply to the Each day Caller Information Basis’s request for remark.
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