Chinese law gives communist government access to data

As of August 15, employees of the U.S. House of Representatives will be banned from using any ByteDance apps on government devices.

TikTok is already out, but now the ban also includes a handful of other apps that you or someone in your life may use.

CapCut: Video editing tools and filters

Hypic: Photo editing tools and filters

Lark: Collaboration app for work

Lemon8: Social media app with a focus on fashion, beauty, travel, food and other lifestyle categories

The reason for this lies in ByteDance’s ties to communist China. The company is based in Beijing and is required by Chinese law to grant the government access to the data it collects.

If you think the ByteDance paranoia is overblown, here’s a long list of the data you reveal every time you scroll through TikTok:

Your name, age, username, email address, password, phone number and location.

Your IP address, your mobile operator, your time zone, the model of your device and the operating system you use.

Biometric identifiers such as facial recognition and voiceprints.

The content of your messages and the exact time when you send, receive and read them.

When you purchase things from the TikTop Store, your purchase information, including your credit card numbers, billing and shipping addresses.

Your activities on other websites and apps (or in stores), including information about your purchases.

• File names and types.
• Your keystroke patterns and rhythms.
• Objects and landscapes that appear in your videos, including tourist attractions, shops, and other points of interest.
• The websites you visit most often and how you interact with them.
• All texts, images and videos in your clipboard.
• Information about your videos, images and audio files.

TikTok also embeds data into images and ads to capture the time and date you visit a page, complete with a description. The amount of data TikTok collects is so vast that it can come dangerously close to cloning your entire phone.

Where TikTok stores its data was also a big red flag for Congress. Information collected in the U.S. is connected directly to servers in China, although the company says it has changed its systems to store American data in the U.S.

Last year, one of my warnings about the mega-popular shopping app went viral. The hype is slowly dying down, but Temu was the most downloaded app of its kind in the US in 2023.

Temu’s slogan – “Shop like a billionaire” – refers to its very low prices on everything from clothing to home goods to electronics.

Although the company is based in the US, Temu is owned by China-based PDD Holdings. And that company also owns Pinduoduo, which was removed from the Google Play Store because it contained malware.

Monitor the activity of other apps

Depending on what you enable, it will have full access to all your contacts, calendars and photo albums, as well as your social media accounts, chats and texts.

Of course, it’s up to you which apps you keep on your phone. You might be happy with simply restricting permissions. But you might want to go a step further.

Delete apps from your iPhone

Touch and hold an app, then tap Remove App, then tap Delete App, then tap Delete.

Or use the App Library to get a curated list of your apps grouped by category. Swipe up from the last page of your Home screen to access it. Tap and hold the app, then select “Delete App,” then “Delete.”

Delete apps from your Android phone:

Long press an app, then tap App info, then tap Uninstall.

Go to Settings and then Apps & Notifications to see a list of your apps and delete them the same way.

Or open the Google Play Store app and navigate to “Menu” then “My apps & games”. Tap the app and click “Uninstall”.

NOTE: On Samsung and OnePlus phones, there is an uninstall option in the app context menu.

But Kim, I need to scroll through TikTok… or any other app on my list above. There is a reasonably safe way to do this, at least without the data from your real phone going anywhere:

Install TikTok on an old device that is no longer connected to your email, banking information, or other data.

If possible, avoid your home Wi-Fi network and purchase a cheap data plan.

Otherwise, be sure to use the guest network. And now ask yourself whether the videos, image editing tools and cheap goods are really worth all the effort.