TikTok Will Cut Off Foreign Data Access, CEO Tells House Commerce

China-based employees can access American users’ TikTok data, but that access will be cut off once the company implements Project Texas (see 2303170043), TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew told the House Commerce Committee Thursday.

Both Democrats and Republicans said they don’t believe Project Texas will solve the national security issues associated with TikTok’s link to parent company ByteDance. The company is lying when it says it’s not beholden to ByteDance, which acts as an extension of the Chinese Communist Party, said Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash.: The company “should be banned” in the U.S.

TikTok transferred Americans’ data overseas in the past for “interoperability purposes,” Chew told the committee in his first appearance testifying on Capitol Hill. House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Bob Latta, R-Ohio, asked Chew if China-based ByteDance employees, including engineers, have access to U.S. user data. This is a “complex topic,” Chew said. When pressed for a yes or no answer, Chew said once Project Texas is implemented, the “answer is no,” but that’s not the case currently. He noted access to the data is controlled by U.S. employees.

House Innovation Subcommittee ranking member Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., also pressed Chew about the overseas sharing of American data. The reported statement from a former TikTok employee that “everything is seen in China” isn’t true, said Chew. TikTok doesn’t collect more data than any other social media company, he said, citing inaccurate and speculative press reports about what data TikTok collects and shares.

TikTok is building a “firewall” to seal off user data from unauthorized foreign access, he said. He said data is stored on U.S. soil by an American company overseen by American personnel. By the end of the year, through Project Texas, all data will be under the protection of U.S. law and overseen by a U.S. team, he said. Asked about a potential sale splitting off TikTok from ByteDance, Chew said: “I don’t think ownership is the issue here. With a lot of respect, American social companies don’t have a good track record with data privacy and user security. I mean, look at Facebook and Cambridge Analytica -- just one example.’

Social media influencers and creators took to Capitol Hill Wednesday with Rep. Jamaal Bowman, D-N.Y., in opposition to a potential U.S. ban for the app. “The rush to ban TikTok sets a dangerous precedent for our country by undermining our freedom of speech and distracts from the real issue: protecting Americans’ data and privacy,” said Bowman. Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., told reporters Thursday TikTok issues require a comprehensive response, including passing privacy legislation. Asked if he’s concerned about Democrats being labeled the party that banned TikTok, Markey said, “No.”

House Commerce Committee ranking member Frank Pallone, D-N.J., said during the hearing he agrees with a lot Rodgers said about TikTok, particularly on the harm to young platform users. Pallone told Chew he doesn’t find Project Texas and its firewall “acceptable.” Pallone said he still believes the Chinese Communist Party will still “be able to control what you do.” Chew wouldn’t commit to Pallone's request that TikTok not sell data to anyone and not track users under the age of 17. The youth-tracking ban was included in bipartisan privacy legislation the House Commerce Committee passed in 2022. Chew told Pallone the company doesn’t sell data to data brokers, and said he will get back to Pallone about not tracking young users and not collecting location and health data. On the amount of data the company collects, TikTok is no different from other social media companies, he said. He disputed Rodgers' claims the company is tracking American journalists and officials through user data. “I disagree with the characterization that there was spying,” he said. “We will protect American data and firewall the data from all unwanted foreign access.”

House Innovation Subcommittee Chair Gus Bilirakis, R-Fla., focused remarks on teen suicide and content encouraging users to kill themselves. He asked Chew if the company is responsible for the algorithms promoting this content. Chew avoided a yes or no answer, saying these outcomes are “devastating.” TikTok takes these issues “very seriously,” he said, citing resources for suicide prevention.

TikTok has more than a billion active global users, including more than 150 million in the U.S., Chew told the committee in opening remarks: The app is a place where people can be “creative and curious.”

Under Chinese law, all Chinese companies are "ultimately required to do the bidding of Chinese intelligence services, should they be called upon to do so,” Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner, D-Va., said in a joint statement with Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., Thursday. “Nothing we heard from Mr. Chew today assuaged those concerns.” They urged continued support and passage of their Restricting the Emergence of Security Threats that Risk Information and Communications Technology (Restrict) Act, a bipartisan bill that would allow the Commerce Department to effectively ban apps like TikTok over national security concerns.