New Zealand has decided to ban the use of the Chinese social networking application TikTok on official devices available to MPs, officials said today, following similar measures applied in other countries.
The ban applies to all devices that access the New Zealand parliament’s internet network, parliamentary official Rafael Gonzalez-Montero told the France-Press news agency.
The ban will take effect on March 31.
The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday that the U.S. Committee on Foreign Investment, part of the Treasury Department, threatened to ban the “application” from the U.S. market unless its owners, Beijing-headquartered ByteDance Ltd., sell the position. .
“If protecting national security is the goal, divestment does not solve the problem: a change of ownership would not impose new restrictions on data flows or access,” said Maureen Shanahan, a TikTok spokesperson.
On Thursday, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin accused the United States of spreading disinformation, claiming that Washington has not provided any evidence that TikTok poses a threat to national security.
In late February, the White House gave federal agencies 30 days to remove TikTok from all government devices. Some agencies, including the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security and the State Department, already had restrictions.
The Belgian federal government also decided last week to ban the use of TikTok on its employees’ official devices, after Canada and the European Commission had made similar decisions.
TikTok is used by two-thirds of American teens, but concerns are growing that Beijing could gain control of American users’ data and that the app could serve to spread pro-Beijing propaganda.
China bans most foreign social networks, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok itself, which is present in the country through its domestic version called Douyin.
Source: DN
