Juno News - It’s time for Canada to ban TikTok

The end is near for TikTok as we know it. Over the last week, American President Donald Trump has signaled he will ban the Chinese-owned social media application completely by September 15, 2020. That is, unless a very secure, and in its own words, very American company, buys the American leg of the app from the Beijing-based firm ByteDance.

00:00:00.000 The end is near for TikTok as we know it. Over the last week, American President Donald Trump

00:00:13.080 has signaled he will ban the Chinese-owned social media application completely by September 15,

00:00:19.080 2020. That is, unless a very secure, and in its own words, very American company,

00:00:25.560 buys the American leg of the app from the Beijing firm ByteDance. This is, of course, a good thing.

00:00:33.900 While appearing as a seemingly harmless social networking application, TikTok actually poses

00:00:40.740 as a huge security risk to its users, including hundreds of thousands of Canadians, whose sensitive

00:00:47.460 personal information could be easily shared with the Chinese Communist state. Specifically, an

00:00:53.880 investigation by an American think tank in January 2019 found that the use of the app requires

00:00:59.460 consenting to a privacy policy that allows TikTok to harvest significant data on its users, including

00:01:05.700 their location, images, and biometric data. As a Beijing-located company, ByteDance is under

00:01:12.600 a legal obligation to share any information with the Communist Chinese regime, who already

00:01:18.000 have a long record of state-sponsored hacking and cyber-espionage, if requested. TikTok is

00:01:24.940 also known for promoting false Chinese narratives, including praising China for their handling

00:01:30.180 of COVID-19, while also silencing users who promote anti-state ideas, like support for Democratic

00:01:37.660 protesters in Hong Kong. If the ban occurs, the US will be the second country to explicitly ban

00:01:45.000 the social media app after India banned TikTok last month following a border flash. In doing

00:01:51.400 so, India similarly cited privacy concerns, including how using the app would threaten their national

00:01:57.180 security.

00:01:59.520 As the US continues progressing to the September 15th ban date, it's clear that Canada should 0.94

00:02:05.260 also do the same. Canadian privacy rights are more important than inflating the pockets

00:02:10.760 of a Chinese state-owned company, and certainly not worth sacrificing for some mindless entertainment.

00:02:17.660 However, do not expect any proposal for a ban in Canada to be without serious resistance,

00:02:24.240 as TikTok has already started gearing up to increase lobbying efforts in Canada. Most recently,

00:02:30.440 TikTok hired the former head of public policy for Amazon Canada to serve as their director

00:02:35.660 of government affairs. The job posting for this position, as we found on LinkedIn, showed TikTok

00:02:42.460 looking for an experienced candidate who can build a relationship with elected officials and advocate

00:02:47.900 policy positions that benefit and protect the TikTok user community. Unfortunately, without serious

00:02:55.580 reform that would need to include separating completely from the Chinese entity, what is good for the 0.96

00:03:00.860 TikTok community will be bad for Canadians. Specifically, those among us who would prefer our information is

00:03:07.340 kept private and far away from the communist state.

Juno News - August 07, 2020

It’s time for Canada to ban TikTok

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