South Dakota Governor Christy Noem signed an executive order banning the use of the TikTok app by government employees due to a national security threat.
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“South Dakota will not participate in the intelligence gathering of countries that hate us. The Chinese Communist Party is using the information collected on TikTok to manipulate Americans,” Noem said in a press release posted on the website.
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“The measure applies to government employees and state agencies, including contractors … It is forbidden to download or use the TikTok application, visit its website from state-owned or state-leased devices,” the decree says.
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Noem expressed her hope that the rest of the US states will follow the example of South Dakota, and in the future, Congress will make a similar decision.
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TikTok is a short video creation and viewing application owned by the Chinese company ByteDance. Launched in 2018, it has become the leader in the short video app segment in China and is gaining popularity around the world.
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Earlier, FCC Commissioner Brandan Carr called on the authorities to ban the social network in the country. The previous US administration attempted to ban the Chinese social platforms TikTok and WeChat in the US in 2020, the main motive for this was to protect the privacy of Americans. The PRC and the companies themselves denied allegations of misuse of user data. After the ban was challenged in court, the Biden administration did not continue to fight for the implementation of the predecessors’ initiative. Recently, however, accusations against the company have begun to resurface.
