Tiktok: Headquarters in China has full access to user data

René Resch

According to a leaked report by Buzzfeed News magazine, Tiktok developer Bytedance probably has unrestricted access to personal user data from US customers and also forwards it to the company’s headquarters in China.

“Everything is viewed in China”

The logs, which contain around 80 recordings and audio recordings, range from September 2021 to January 2022. As recently as October 2021, a Tiktok manager testified under oath that

“a world-renowned US-based security team”

is responsible for the analysis of the data and monitors access to it.

However, the records paint a different picture:

“Everything is seen in China”,

says an employee at Bytedance in a meeting. Some Chinese employees even have admin status and can view all data collected by Tiktok at will and forward it to the headquarters in China.

The extent to which the Chinese people’s government has access remains unclear

However, the fact that Chinese employees have access to the US data does not mean that they are also shared with the Chinese government. Tiktok employees told Buzzfeed that people linked to the Chinese government do not appear to have access to data in the United States.

“Chinese government officials are not allowed to join”,

it said on the part of the anonymous employees. However, the team must report to the headquarters in China, parts of which were bought by the state.

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