Dianna “Mick” McDougall
· less than 3 min read
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It’s no secret that the government considers TikTok a national security threat. But in an interview with Bloomberg yesterday, Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo suggested that the government is concerned about the dangers posed by other Chinese apps, too.
“If what we’re worried about is Chinese-backed companies being on tens of millions of American phones, including members of the military and privacy concerns, data concerns, misinformation concerns—it doesn’t just apply to TikTok,” she said.
Thing is, Chinese apps are the most popular apps in the US right now. The top three free apps on Apple’s App Store yesterday were Temu, CapCut, and TikTok, while Google Play’s were Temu, TikTok, and Street Fighter: Duel—with Chinese fast-fashion company Shein chilling at No. 4.
Except for Street Fighter, all of these apps are based in China and have been downloaded onto American devices hundreds of millions of times.
For now, TikTok has the biggest target on its back:
An exec at the think tank founded by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt wrote last month that all of these uber-popular Chinese apps, including the messenger WeChat and game apps from Tencent, “could pose similar challenges [to TikTok], particularly with respect to data harvesting, data exploitation, and—possibly—covert influence.”
But others say the fears are #ghosttok-level overblown…and judging by the apps’ enormous number of downloads, the average American ain’t afraid of no posts. For all the scrutiny of TikTok, technologist and author Kevin Xu wrote, “US legislators, policymakers, and think-tankers have yet to produce any concrete evidence of harm done by the app.”—JW
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