TikTok CEO Shou Chew has made his first appearance before the United States Congress, where he was hit by fierce criticism from lawmakers, including calls for the app to be banned.
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Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, opened Thursday's hearing by tearing into TikTok.
"Your platform should be banned," she told Shou.
"I expect today you'll say anything to avoid this outcome.
" ... We aren't buying it. In fact, when you celebrate the 150 million American users on TikTok, it emphasises the urgency for Congress to act.
"That is 150 million Americans that the [Chinese Communist Party] can collect sensitive information on."
In his opening remarks, Chew attempted to stress TikTok's independence from China and played up its U.S. ties.
"TikTok itself is not available in mainland China, we're headquartered in Los Angeles and Singapore, and we have 7000 employees in the US today," he said.
"Still, we have heard important concerns about the potential for unwanted foreign access to US data and potential manipulation of the TikTok US ecosystem.
"Our approach has never been to dismiss or trivialise any of these concerns. We have addressed them with real action."
As lawmakers doubled down on their questions about TikTok's data collection practices, Chew also emphasised that the data TikTok collects is data "that's frequently collected by many other companies in our industry".
"We are committed to be very transparent with our users about what we collect," Chew said.
"I don't believe what we collect is more than most players in the
ndustry."
Multiple lawmakers have also highlighted concerns about TikTok's impact on children, including Democratic ranking member of the committee Representative Frank Pallone.
"Research has found that TikTok's algorithms recommend videos to teens that create and exacerbate feelings of emotional distress, including videos promoting suicide, self-harm and eating disorders," he said.
"Let me state this unequivocally," Chew will say, according to a copy of his remarks released by a House panel. "ByteDance is not an agent of China or any other country."
"While I appreciate Mr Chew's willingness to answer questions before Congress, TikTok's lack of transparency, repeated obfuscations, and misstatements of fact have severely undermined the credibility of any statements by TikTok employees, including Mr Chew," Senator Mark R Warner, chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, said in a statement Wednesday. ■