TikTok Now Banned From Work Telephones in Belgium Citing Safety Danger

Belgian federal authorities workers will not be allowed to make use of the Chinese language-owned video app TikTok on their work telephones, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo mentioned on Friday.

De Croo mentioned the Belgian nationwide safety council had warned of the dangers related to the massive quantities of knowledge collected by TikTok, which is owned by Chinese language agency ByteDance, and the truth that the corporate is required to cooperate with Chinese language intelligence companies.

“That’s the actuality,” the prime minister mentioned in an announcement.

“That is why it’s logical to forbid the usage of TikTok on telephones offered by the federal authorities. The protection of our info should prevail.”

TikTok in an announcement mentioned it was dissatisfied with a call it mentioned was based mostly on “essentially incorrect info”.

The corporate mentioned it shops consumer knowledge within the US and Singapore and is constructing knowledge facilities in Europe.

“The Chinese language authorities cannot pressure different sovereign nations to share knowledge that’s saved of their territory,” a spokesman for the corporate mentioned.

The European Fee and the European Parliament final month banned TikTok from employees telephones as a consequence of rising considerations in regards to the firm, and whether or not China’s authorities may harvest customers’ knowledge or advance its pursuits.

Beijing has commonly denied having any such intentions.

Belgium’s Flemish regional authorities on Thursday introduced it might prohibit entry to TikTok on employees telephones, and different regional governments had been urged by De Croo to use the identical guidelines.

The video-sharing app has already been banned from work telephones in US and Canada, whereas it has been utterly banned in India.

© Thomson Reuters 2023

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