Soldiers of US Army are banned from using the social media app TikTok

US Army soldiers serving the US Army are now no longer allowed to use the Tik Tok app on their government-owned smartphones which came after a ban imposed by the US Army. This ban comes in the midst of all kinds of ongoing worries that the Tik Tok video app that is owned by the Beijing based ByteDance could cause a serious threat to the national security of the US or could also be used for influencing or surveillance of the Americans.

Lt. Col. Robin Ochoa, the spokesperson for US Army said, “It is considered a cyber threat”. This news about the ban came back on 30^th December and the army reportedly used the Tik Tok video app for recruiting the army members prior to this ban.

The Navy and Defense Department both have sounded alarms on the Tik Tok app earlier in December. The Navy specifically told its soldiers to not add this vide app anymore and also to delete it entirely from their Government issued smart devices if the app is already installed on them.

The Defense Department also instructed its workers to beware of the apps that they download on their smart devices and to monitor their devices for any unsolicited and unusual texts. They also instructed their employees to immediately uninstall and delete the Tik Tok app to avoid any exposure of their personal information.

For a long time now, the Tik Tok video app is under the scrutiny of the CFIUS (Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States) following the demands from lawmakers to look whether the Chinese Government is collecting the user data or is controlling the content that is currently being shared.

Tik Tok app has also been alleged for usage in the meddling of the elections as well as the silencing of the protestors of Hong Kong. As or Tik Top, they said that they have not removed any content as they were asked by the Chinese government itself to not do any such thing and they would also not do this in the future.