Why Europe and Canada joined the US TikTok ban for government phones

Created in 2016 by the Chinese company ByteDance, TikTok has more than a billion monthly users, making it one of the most used social networks in the world. But recently, more and more concerns are being raised about the dangers associated with the app.

TikTok is accused of being a "data vacuum cleaner" that transfers information of hundreds of millions of users to China, especially from the West.

In addition, the risks of the social network for the brain, especially among teenagers, have been singled out. The app is based on very short video formats, that can affect concentration and learning abilities, according to experts.

There are also fears of TikTok being a source of disinformation, in an international context marked by the war in Ukraine and by tensions in the Asia-Pacific zone, where China seems determined to regain control of Taiwan.

In this context, the European Commission decided on February 23 to ban TikTok from the professional devices of its employees.

"As an institution, the European Commission has, from the start of its mandate, focused on cybersecurity, the protection of its employees", indicated the European Commissioner for Industry, Thierry Breton, quoted by ' France 24'.

The French commissioner insisted on the need to preserve the European institutions: "We are obviously in no way obliged to give the reasons for which we take [such] decisions in the interest of our own colleagues, the proper functioning of the institutions and its preservation".

In concrete terms, anyone working for the European Commission has until March 15 to uninstall the Chinese application from their professional devices. It will also no longer be possible to install it for employees who did not use it before.

The Commission has also required that its employees uninstall TikTok from their personal devices, including telephones, when apps from the European institutions are installed there, such as e-mail systems or apps for videoconferencing.

The ban on the social network was quickly extended to all EU institutions: on February 28, the European Parliament announced that it had also decided to ban the use of TikTok on the professional devices of its employees.

Finally, the European Council, where the heads of state and government of the EU member countries sit, must soon adopt an equivalent banning measure.

With this decision, the EU is following in the footsteps of the United States that prohibits downloading and using TikTok on the devices of federal agents. Around twenty American states have decided on an equivalent measure for their own employees.

TikTok could even completely disappear from American territory. Congress is currently discussing a new bill providing for its total ban in the USA. And the retaliatory measures against China are among the rare points of consensus between Republicans and Democrats.

Following the US and then the EU, Canada also banned TikTok on government devices because it presents an “unacceptable level of risk to privacy and security”, said its Chief Information Officer.

TikTok obviously regretted the ban on its use decided by the European, American and Canadian authorities. But while the company acknowledged at the end of 2022 that European user data had been transferred to China, it continues to deny that the Beijing regime has access to it.

A headache for institutions, TikTok also represents a risk for the private sector in the West. The social network is attracting more and more young employees and theft of intellectual property via devices used in companies cannot be ruled out.

We are therefore witnessing a global war of data and information, visible through these outright ban decisions that were still unthinkable a few years ago. The coming months will tell us to what extent Western states intend to limit the use of TikTok on their territory.