Washington, USA (CNN) — The White House has directed federal agencies that they have 30 days to remove the “TikTok” short video application from all government agencies.
Shalanda Young, director of the Office of Management and Budget, wrote in the directive issued Monday that all enforcement agencies, and those they contract with, must remove any app from TikTok or its parent company, ByteDance, within 30 days of the notice being issued. , with a few exceptions.
“Within 90 days, agencies must include in contracts that the short video app cannot be used on devices, and they must cancel any contracts requiring use of the app,” the directive added.
The memo from the Biden administration would make the executive branch and its contractors comply with a bill passed at the end of last year that requires federal agencies to abandon TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance. It marks the latest effort to clamp down on the app amid renewed security concerns about data from US users of the app that could find its way to the Chinese government.
The bill moved quickly through Congress last December. Reuters first spoke about the guidance.
US officials have raised concerns that the Chinese government could pressure ByteDance into handing over information collected from users, which could be used for intelligence purposes or to spread disinformation.
As CNN reported earlier, independent security experts have said that this type of data access is likely, although no incident has been reported in this regard, yet.
“The TikTok ban on federal agencies was passed in December, without any deliberation, and unfortunately this approach was a blueprint for other governments,” Brock Oberwetter, a spokesman for TikTok, said in a statement, adding: “We hope when it comes to addressing concerns The national security on TikTok outside of government is for Congress to explore solutions that will not have the effect of censoring the voices of millions of Americans.”
Canada also announced that it would block the app on government devices starting Tuesday, and last week the European Commission issued a ban on the app on official devices, citing cybersecurity concerns.
And more than half of the US states also banned the application of TikTok partially or completely on the devices of government employees, and the US House of Representatives announced earlier that it is in the application on the electronic devices it manages.
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