The end of TikTok in the United States could be a reality as the Supreme Court considers a law that would ban the app, which is based on concerns that the Chinese government could gain access to users’ data or influence the videos people see in their feeds.
“I really think the issue with the ban, from the government perspective, is more about the algorithm and the influence that a social media platform can have more so than them having the data,” said Alex Hamerstone, the advisory solutions director for TrustedSec, an ethical hacking company.
People are easily influenced, added Hamerstone, and TikTok is ripe with misinformation ranging from fake political videos to false health information. “So, I think just the ability to influence users is so great that the government’s worried about who controls that,” Hamerstone said.
But it’s worth noting that misinformation is rampant on other social media platforms, like Instagram. Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Meta (Facebook and Instagram’s parent company), recently announced that the company will do away with fact-checking, leaving room for more misinformation online. These apps, however, are not up for a ban.
Beyond misinformation and influence, Kevin Johnson, the CEO of Secure Ideas, a security testing and consulting company, thinks “TikTok made some people angry, and they decided that what they would do is they would ban TikTok.” Another argument for the ban is that “it’s for the ‘good of the children, it’s going to protect their privacy,’” Johnson said. “But the reality is, [a ban] is not going to protect anybody’s privacy.”
“One, people will continue to use TikTok, they’ll get past the ban. It’s pretty trivial to get past it,” Johnson said. “Two, the data that TikTok has collected is not going to go away … TikTok has no requirement ― just because we banned them from the U.S. ― to delete U.S. citizens’ data.”
What exactly even is the data in question here? Think about your name, email address, phone number, search history, location, TikTok messages you send, contact list and more. (By no means is TikTok the only app that collects this data — but more on that in a minute.)
Most importantly, the federal government hasn’t passed a federal privacy law of any kind, “and so we have data brokers … who are collecting data about people every minute of every day that are going to continue to do that,” Johnson said.
Is it really so bad for companies to have your data?
“The reality is ― and I’m probably an unpopular opinion ― I believe that we have a right to privacy, but I also believe that we failed at protecting that right” decades ago, Johnson said.
It’s true: I signed up for Facebook in 2006 and MySpace even before that, and the same for millions of others. I was a teenager at the time; I wasn’t thinking about sharing data like my name, photos, hometown or favorite song when I signed up, and neither were most people, I’m willing to bet. These social media sites have had this data for a long time.
“We’re really just dealing with Pandora’s Box having been opened, right? We’ve lost the ability to go back and say, ‘Oh man, I should be private.’ We now have to deal with the repercussions of having made the wrong decision [decades] ago,” Johnson added.
“Our data is everywhere — let’s be blunt. There have been so many breaches of organizations where data has been stolen that pretty much everybody in the country … their data is basically public,” Johnson continued.
Think about the hospital, insurance and credit card leaks that have happened even in the last few years. And these breaches are just half of the problem, said Johnson — “the core issue for privacy is the fact that organizations have been selling data willingly to data brokers for years.”
Data brokers collect information on where you’re shopping, what you’re searching, driving, watching, your health data, job information and more. Many people refer to data as “the new currency,” and they’re not wrong. With this information, advertisers can better target you, you can be served deals via an app when walking into a store or you can be alerted to traffic along your route to work.
“Data collection does make some services better,” Hamerstone said. “But it kind of comes down to, I think, a personal decision. Is the trade off of my information being out there worth the benefits that I get?”
While some of your data may not be risky for others to know about, such as your interest in cleaning videos on TikTok or puppy memes on Facebook, other data can be dangerous if it is in the hands of the wrong person.
For instance, when Johnson was recently looking for a new doctor, “almost every single doctor’s office gave me the option to sign in with Google or Facebook, which means that if I used one of those two options … I would be giving Facebook or Google access to the data I submitted to that doctor.”
While it’s fine for them to know your meme preferences, you probably don’t want Google or Facebook to know your health history.
How can you protect your data now?
When asked if TikTok users should delete their accounts ahead of the ban, Johnson said it’s up to you, but there is no inherent risk in not deleting your account.
“It really boils down to: Do you trust that if you delete your data, they’ll actually delete your data? And if the answer is yes, then I would think about deleting my data,” Johnson said.
“But this also assumes that the ban is actually going to go into effect and stay in effect. If you’re a TikTok user, and you go and delete all your data … and then they ban TikTok, and then TikTok sues, and then the courts say you can’t ban TikTok, if that happens, well, then you’ve deleted your account. Does that affect your livelihood?” Johnson said.
For someone who makes money on TikTok or posts on TikTok for a brand, deleting your account is likely not a wise choice. “Those people are just going to have to accept the fact they can’t delete the data because they use it,” Johnson said.
For the average user who scrolls the app for entertaining videos, it’s up to you if you delete TikTok, but it likely won’t move the data collection needle much either way.
“Personally, as a user of TikTok, I’m not deleting my data. I’m not requesting that they delete my data. I have accepted the fact that if they’re going to do bad things with my data, they’re already going to do it,” Johnson noted.
While Hamerstone doesn’t know how TikTok manages or uses the data it collects, any data damage is likely done when you sign up for the app. “Generally, I hate to say it, but once the data is out there, it’s out there,” Hamerstone said. You probably have an Instagram account, LinkedIn account, Facebook account and more, all with a lot of the same data on TikTok.
“Even in places where there’s very strong [privacy laws], even companies that really do their best effort to remove your data, they don’t always know where it all is, so they can’t,” Hamerstone said.
Beyond TikTok, there are ways to protect your data when signing up for apps or websites in the future.
Johnson recommends reading the terms and conditions and the user license agreement when signing up for a new site or app, but he acknowledged that most people won’t do that. He noted that if you don’t read the terms, you should limit what you agree to.
“I take the time to pay attention to which check boxes I check. So when it says to me, ‘Would you like us to share information with our third-party partners to get you better marketing?’ I uncheck that box,” Johnson said.
Your passwords are also a first line of defense for your data. “One of the best pieces of advice I can give anybody ever about information security is don’t reuse passwords because that’s an extremely common way that people have problems,” Hamerstone said. “If you were to tell me your username and your password for TikTok, there are programs out there that I can use that would try that username and password combination on every banking site and every email site in the world.”
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More often than not, people use the same passwords and usernames, making it easier for hackers to access different accounts.
“I think make sure that you’re using unique passwords across everything is one of the best pieces of advice,” Hamerstone said.
But, when it comes to your data and TikTok, you likely don’t need to be concerned now whether the app is banned in the U.S. or not ― at least when it comes to your personal data. Unfortunately (or fortunately), the information the app has is information all other apps have, too.