Canada and US issued statement to ban the TikTok from government issued mobile devices due to security reasons. Now TikTok is been banned in Canada, as TikTok is under investigation by Canadian privacy authorities.
TikTok has been one of the trending apps globally in recent years, many teenagers, and other age group has started using the app for short videos and many of them got featured in it. However, this app has recently faced issues by getting banned from several countries for data security issues but is running in most countries for its popularity in sharing trending content.
One of the main concerns is that TikTok collects vast amounts of data on its users, including their location data, browsing history, and even the content of their messages.
As a reason, most countries banning this most popular app because it collects more user data in comparison to other social media apps that run independently by their own management, and the data is not held in China even though Bytedance owns TikTok app.
With the data privacy and national security, there are also concerns that TikTok could be used to influence public opinion. The app has been accused of censoring content that is important for the Chinese government, and there have been reports of Chinese government officials using the app to spread disinformation.
Countries that have banned the TikTok:
India
India banned TikTok for its Privacy reasons and this ban created clash between two countries. The county was said to respond the security and privacy concerns but due to non-response of the queries the TikTok was permanently banned from India including the Wechat messaging app.
Taiwan
Even Taiwan was the country that has banned TikTok after the FBI warning for the national security Risk. It was banned from Government devices, Including Mobile phones, Tablets, desktop which are not allowed to use Chinese made software like TikTok.
European Union
The ban for European Commission employees is set to come into force actively. The video-sharing platform, owned by Chinese giant Byte Dance, has come under examination over concerns that it hands information to Beijing.
The company insists that Chinese government officials don’t have access to user data and that a Chinese version of the app is separate from the one used in the rest of the world. But last year, the company admitted some staff in China can access the data of European users.
Pakistan
Pakistani authorities have banned TikTok for four times for immoral contents being promoted in the app and has blocked the access to it so that the user can’t use the app. The share of inappropriate content and obscenity on the platform and its failure to take down the content.
The ban passed by Singh High court was in response to petition field by the resident of Punjab province, who alleged that the TikTok was promoting the crime as people were using the weapons and drugs in the videos.
After the first ban of TikTok of promoting the content not allowed for users. The other ban has lifted within 10 days for taking action against the inappropriate content shared to the user.
Afghanistan
In Afghanistan’s Taliban leadership banned TikTok of protecting the youths from being misled.
Banning the TikTok app for the negative impact it had on youth generation and its inconsistencies with the Islamic laws which are not compatible.
United States
The Chinese government has accused the United States of overreacting in its decision to order federal employees to remove the popular video-sharing app, TikTok, from government-issued phones. This strained the relationship between the US and China.
The white house has made an announcement that employees must not have TikTok app in their device and has given 30 days to remove the app.
The US government’s decision to ban TikTok was motivated by concerns that the app, which is owned by Chinese tech company ByteDance, poses a national security risk. US lawmakers have expressed concerns that the Chinese government could use TikTok to spy on US citizens.
After the TikTok been banned from US, China has accused the US of politicizing technology and unfairly targeting Chinese companies. The Chinese government has also taken steps to restrict US tech companies’ access to the Chinese market, including banning popular social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter.
