By George Schroeder | LTVN Executive Producer
On Monday, Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced a plan to ban TikTok across the state, and it’s a long-overdue move that will begin eradicating the most invasive social media platform from the app store.
“Texans, especially our state agencies and employees, must be protected from having sensitive information shared with the Chinese Communist Party. We cannot ignore this security threat,” Abbott posted on Twitter.
He’s absolutely right.
Not only is the app highly addictive and contributes to shortening attention spans, an aid in procrastination and sleep deprivation and a large contributor to misinformation of all kinds, the app gathers huge amounts of data from its over 1.5 billion users, even when the app isn’t in use. TikTok is owned by ByteDance, a Chinese technology company, and allows third-party trackers to gather personal information, like location or search history, according to a January 2022 study published by URL Genius.
Abbott announced state agencies must implement plans to ban the app on any state-owned or personal devices used to conduct state business by Feb. 15. More information on the details of the app can be found here.
This move comes after Abbott banned the use of TikTok on all government-issued devices last month. Since then, several universities, not including Baylor, across the state have banned the app’s use on campus Wi-Fi and devices.
So what data is TikTok collecting that makes it so dangerous?
Just scratching the surface, TikTok collects your IP address, unique number, any web pages you’re on and what you are clicking, liking, typing, or googling according to Malwarebytes (the same company that protects my laptop).
Other social media apps pretty much do this exact same thing for marketing purposes, but with TikTok, it actually gets worse.
The app also literally tracks every tap and keystroke made on your smart device. Theoretically, while TikTok is installed, I don’t think any password, credit card number or any other sensitive information is safe.
Even still, I’m sure there are people who don’t really care — trust me — I used to be in that boat too. I’d say things like: “No one is actually tracking what I do on my phone,” or,“Well, I have nothing to hide, so go right ahead and spy on me.”
And let’s be honest, sometimes the tailored advertisements are actually convenient. Who cares if TikTok does it too?
Ask yourself this: With tracking like that, what if a U.S. Senator, a military officer or a high-ranking government official has TikTok on their device? That information would be very interesting to the Chinese government.
That’s an issue, and if the tracking information wasn’t enough to convince you, here’s even more.
In a letter to state agency heads, Abbott said the company that owns TikTok “employs Chinese Communist Party members and has a subsidiary that is partially owned by the Chinese Communist Party.”
We’re talking about the same country whose surveillance balloon we just shot down over the Atlantic Ocean. We’re talking about an app that collects massive amounts of whatever data it wants for a company at the mercy of a U.S. adversary.
Secondly, the data collection method of TikTok separates it from its counterparts. Sites like Facebook are sent information by pages you visit, and this information collection can be mitigated or limited through various means. TikTok’s operation is far more dubious and exploitative.
TikTok uses what is known as a “tracking pixel.” Literally a graphic with a dimension of a 1×1 pixel (for reference the iPhone 14 has a resolution of 1170px by 2532px —good luck finding one pixel) which is loaded each time the user does specific things on their device like visiting a webpage or opening an email. You’d never know, but TikTok is always watching you.
“These tracking pixels are partly or fully designed to be transparent, or camouflaged in the background color of the website so that they don’t stand out to users,” according to Ryte.com. This is not exactly a transparent operation, in fact, according to Malwarebytes, most companies are unaware TikTok even gathers data from them.
“The only reason this works is because it’s a secret operation. Some people might not care, but people should have a choice. It shouldn’t be happening in the shadows,” Disconnect Chief Technology Officer Patrick Jackson says.
TikTok is designed to be addictive and the format of the app has been so successful that it has been replicated by every single major social media platform except Twitter (which is basically word-TikTok anyways).
We all know it’s funny to make fun of those weird Instagram Reels people who get the jokes and trends two months late, but it’s time to make a switch and delete what might be a literal tool of the Chinese Communist Party.
I applaud Governor Abbott for his initiative. Quite frankly, this ban is well overdue and needs to be taken to a federal level and applied to not only official state and federal business, but all U.S. citizens.
China is not our friend. There are already predictions that war with China is coming in two years, why give our adversary access to, well, anyone’s everything?
Take a step back and ask yourself: are you really gaining anything from the app? Would your life be that much worse if you didn’t have TikTok? Mine got better when I didn’t scroll endlessly at night or in between every single break throughout the day, so I bet yours will too.
Get a head start on congress and let the last thing TikTok tracks be the keystrokes you take to delete it.
