Burlington bans TikTok from City-owned devices
Published March 13, 2023 at 9:41 am
Following the lead taken by other public bodies across Canada, Burlington will be removing and blocking the use of the social media app TikTok on City-issued devices.
“After careful consideration, including research and review done prior to the Federal government’s and Provincial government’s announcements, the City of Burlington gave notice to staff on March 10 that the municipality will be removing and blocking the use of the social media app TikTok on City-issued devices. This decision also follows guidance issued by the Canadian Centre of Cyber Security,” stated Mayor Marianne Mead Ward on her website.
Concerns about TikTok have been raised over the social media app’s security. The Chinese government has a stake in TikTok’s owner, ByteDance, and Chinese laws allow the country to demand access to user data.
The company that owns TikTok maintains that it does not share data with China’s government and its data is not held in that country. Still, Canadian governments believe the Chinese government can influence the content on TikTok as well as exploit user data. Those fears have been fueled by recent reports that China may have used cyber technology to interfere in Canadian elections.
The use of TIkTok has skyrocketed in recent years and is popular with young people who use it to share short videos. Some politicians have since jumped on the TikTok bandwagon to reach a younger audience.
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