TikTok is working to ensure EU data won’t enter China

TikTok is owned by Chinese tech company ByteDance and has come under fire since the company admitted some employees had access to user data in the US and Europe.

Fear of data theft

More and more governments and parliaments are banning TikTok on their employees’ work phones and other work devices for fear of data theft and espionage. For example, last week D66, ChristenUnie and Party for the Animals called on all political parties in the Netherlands to stop using TikTok until the social media platform has resolved all security issues.

Theo Bertram, vice president of European public policy at TikTok, acknowledges that there are “genuine concerns” among Western governments about China. “I think we have a higher obligation to demonstrate how we secure user data.”

Self-registered

According to him, TikTok will therefore work the same way in Europe as in the United States. In this country, where TikTok is no longer authorized on the mobile phones and tablets of many civil servants, a special agreement has been signed with Oracle.

This company guarantees that the data of American users is stored on servers in the United States itself and does not leave the country.

New data centers

“We are working on three new data centers and we will also work with a partner,” Bertram says of the approach in Europe, without naming the partner or giving further details.

TikTok has around 150 million users in Europe, including 25 million in the UK. The app has over a billion users worldwide.