Senate Passes Bill Banning TikTok on Government Devices – CNET [CNET]

The bill comes amid similar bans at the state level and pushes for wider restrictions on the social media app.

The US Senate on Wednesday passed a bill that would enact a ban on the popular social media platform TikTok for government devices. The bill, introduced last year by Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO), was passed by unanimous consent. It needs to pass the House of Representatives and be signed by President Joe Biden before it becomes law.

Lawmakers have argued the TikTok and its Chinese-based parent company ByteDance pose a national security threat because it collects a lot of data on its users and could share it with the Chinese government, an argument TikTok disputes.

“Once again, Sen. Hawley has moved forward with legislation to ban TikTok on government devices, a proposal which does nothing to advance U.S. national security interests. We hope that rather than continuing down that road, he will urge the Administration to move forward on an agreement that would actually address his concerns,” a TikTok spokesperson said in a statement emailed to CNET.

The bill passed the Senate the day after a separate bill, one that would bar TikTok in the US entirely, was introduced by lawmakers in both the House and the Senate. A growing group of states have taken action against TikTok, barring the app from government devices at the state level.

In November, Christopher Wray, director of the FBI, said TikTok could be used “to control data collection on millions of users, or control the recommendation algorithm, which could be used for influence operations if they so choose, or to control software on millions of devices.”

At the time, a TikTok spokesperson said the company was “confident that we are on a path to fully satisfy all reasonable US national security concerns.”