Market: TikTok CEO to testify before Congress in March


(Reuters) – TikTok Chief Executive Shou Zi Chew will appear before the U.S. Energy and Commerce Committee in March as lawmakers want to take a close look at the Chinese video-sharing app, its chairwoman said on Monday. , Cathy McMorrisRodgers.

Shou Zi Chew’s testimony, scheduled for March 23, will be his first appearance before a congressional committee, Cathy McMorris Rodgers said in a statement.

The statement comes as the House Foreign Affairs Committee plans to vote next month on a bill to block the use of TikTok in the United States on national security grounds.

“TikTok, owned by ByteDance, knowingly allowed the Chinese Communist Party to access American user data,” Cathy McMorris Rodgers said, adding that Americans deserve to know the impact of these actions on their privacy and security. of their data.

TikTok confirmed on Monday that Shou Zi Chew will testify before Congress.

On Friday, TikTok said that “calls for a total ban on TikTok take a piecemeal approach to national security and a piecemeal approach to big industry issues such as data security, privacy and online harm.”

Cathy McMorris Rodgers and other Republican lawmakers have demanded more information from TikTok about its impact on young people, amid concerns about harmful content and potential sexual exploitation of minors on the platform, the statement said.

For three years, TikTok – which has more than 100 million American users – has sought to reassure Washington that the personal data of American citizens is not accessible and that its content cannot be manipulated by the Chinese Communist Party or anyone else influenced by Beijing.

The Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States (CFIUS), a body responsible for US national security, in 2020 ordered ByteDance to divest TikTok over concerns that US user data could be passed to the Chinese government.

CFIUS and TikTok have been seeking a national security agreement for two years to protect the data of US TikTok users.

(Report Maria Ponnezhath in Bangalore; French version Dagmarah Mackos)

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