Why counties bans TikTok and why it matters!
Marcus Murray
Founder of Truesec Group | Protecting the society, governments & organizations against cyber threats | Threat Intelligence | Defense | Offense | Winner of Grand Security Award 2023 | No 1 most influential in Tech 2023
Is TikTok a security threat?
Lawmakers in Europe, the United States, and Canada are currently working to restrict access to TikTok, the massively popular short-form video app that is owned by the Chinese company Bytedance.
TikTok is currently downloaded 2.6 Billion times and every month actively used by 1 billion users worldwide, why is TikTok a potential security problem?
In this post I′ll share some insights and perspectives.
A little bit of context from a geopolitical standpoint. Polarization has quicky become the new geopolitical trend. Looking from the western world's perspective, Russia is defined as an antagonistic state since they initiated the invasion of Ukraine. The relationship with China however, is much more complex. Our economies are intertwined and we look at China as both a partner and a competitor in business and trade, at the same time our political views and ideology differ in some ways to an antagonistic level. On the military level China is evolving as a superpower that could potentially one day challenge the US.
With this in mind let's pretend for a while that a Chinese intelligence community was tasked with four tasks.
Now imagine that the Chinese intelligence have access to a mobile application installed on 2.6 billion devices and frequently used by a billion individuals with capabilities that could potentially facilitate all these tasks.
These potential risks explains why lawmakers are working to ban or limit the use of TikTok.
Will TikTok ever be used for these purposes??Well, the question should be reversed, how can we ensure that it cannot or will never be used for any of these purposes? Do we trust the Chinese government, or the company Bytedance to never misuse the TikTok app or the data its harvests? Let′s just say that the trust level is not the highest.
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There are many public articles about TikToc explaining the inner workings of the app, how intrusive it is, previous integrity breaches etc. The fact is that TikTok is more intrusive than it needs to be.. In addition to that the application and it′s data can potentially be affected by the Chinese government since Chinese employees at Bytedance, like every Chinese citizens are subjects to Chinas National Intelligence Law in which Article 7 creates the “obligation of Chinese citizens to support national intelligence work". That law should however not authorize pre-emptive spying etc. but again, it′s all about trust.
A note about the young people using TikTok.
Being a father of four kids in various ages I have studied their social network behavior and believe me, it′s difficult for a father to enforce a family ban on TikTok, it′s a very popular app and they have made a great job in making their users addicted to the dopamine It generates and the social meeting place they have created.
From a personal perspective however, I get scared when I see how it can impact for example my 16-year old son, him being one of millions of followers of the violent, misogynistic world of the TikTok star, Andrew Tate.
As a father I have a responsibility to educate my son that a lot of things he learns from TikTok, and especially Andrew Tate that is just wrong and destructive. However it really is a potent tool when it comes to affect people, especially the younger generations that are not yet great at fact-checking.
10-40 years from now our future leaders of the society might very well be the young TikTok users of today.
I sure hope that their secrets and personal life is kept far away from TikToks servers.
Marcus Murray, Truesec
”Is TikTok really a security threat?” In my professional opinion; in this day and age, most probably yes. The source is one that does not resonate with me or my values. Is any social media giant a threat to our young ones? Debatable, but to some extent, yes. I have two young ones and I try, which to some extent I admit is hard in our digital age, to teach them fundamental human values, to question whatever they get fed from the digital world, wherever it comes from. For me and my loved ones, what is real, is our everyday physical life. What you experience, good or bad, and what you take away from that experience is what makes me and them grow. The digital window, in whatever shape or form that takes, it is just that, a window. It can be altered, it can be true, it can be false. It should be treated accordingly and interaction with it should be made knowingly of the same.
Entrepreneurial Leader | Board Member | Focused on Growth & Business Development
1 年Thanks for a great post Marcus!
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1 年Jag lyssnade p? SvD:s podd Den digitala draken d?r det framkom att Tiktok skiljer ut sig fr?n andra sociala medier genom att inte spara och analysera big data, utan enbart anv?nda AI. Om det st?mmer borde resonemanget vara ?verfl?digt.
Information Technology Security Consultant at RegionMidtjylland
1 年Thanks Marcus for an interesting write-up on this "hotpot" of a case with TikTok (pun intended) ;-) I think you make good and valid points - It is a scary scenario, and with a regime as closed as the Chinese, who is to know what the truth really is. On the other hand, who CAN WE TRUST in reality, if it is not TikTok it is someone else like LinkedIn, Facebook, Snapchat Etc. Etc. –, and are Google or Amazons digital assistants spying on us? I am no advocate for TikTok (even though I did get 5 likes on a video there once ;-) ), but I am questioning if the scale is as simple as "is a company Chinese or not". In Europe some are worried about USA and FISA 702, are the Americans listening in on "us", according to Snowden "Yes" – has that listening lead to influencing – I would be surprised if not. Do we trust Americans more than the Chinese, maybe - but the water is surely getting muddy. So at night when you say "Alexa, turn of the bedroom lights", are you really safe or do "someone" listen to our snore (or even more scary – play suggestive speech while we sleep – ok ok, perhaps the last part is a bit steep).. I say go with the slogan from X-Files "TRUST NO ONE" (at least I think that is where I have it from).
Regional Sales Manager at CrowdStrike
1 年Thanks for sharing, Marcus. Insightful as always.