During a House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing on Thursday, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew argued that “spying” is not the proper term for what China is said to have done to Americans who use his company’s social media platform.
Rep. Neal Dunn (R-FL) questioned Chew if ByteDance, which owns TikTok, has spied on people in the United States.
Chew remarked, “I don’t think spying is the right word for it.”
Dunn questioned a claim that the FBI and Justice Department are looking into ByteDance because four workers were fired for using controversial software to follow the location of two journalists in the United States. The firm has already admitted that it had fired the four employees.
Lucas Nolan of Breitbart News wrote last week:
After ByteDance revealed that its workers had gotten into the data of U.S. users without permission, opponents in Congress started to worry about how TikTok monitors its users. Forbes says that subpoenas have been sent to ByteDance by the DOJ. But it’s still not clear how far the inquiry of what happened has gotten. People have also been interviewed by the FBI about this case, although it is not known yet if these interviews are part of the same investigation.
In a statement on the problem, a ByteDance representative said, “We have strongly condemned the actions of the people who were found to be involved, and they are no longer working at ByteDance.” The representative also said that the company’s internal inquiry is still going on and that ByteDance plans to help with any formal investigations if they come up.
Concerns about TikTok’s effects on national security and privacy have reached a fever pitch in Washington, DC, where lawmakers are still trying to decide if the legislative branch needs to ban the popular but controversial app outright or pass privacy laws. Others have asked for TikTok and ByteDance to be split up.
Rep. Bob Latta (R-OH) also criticized TikTok at the hearing for promoting harmful tendencies that have killed American youths and kids:
As House legislators kept asking questions of TikTok’s CEO, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) told them to cease using the app, calling it “one of the biggest geopolitical threats America has ever faced.”