TikTok launches ‘Texas Plan’ to better protect US user data

IT House July 2 news, earlier this week, the US FCC commissioner called on Apple and Google to remove the TikTok app from their respective app stores. Today, TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, has responded to the situation and confirmed that some Chinese employees can access the data of some American TikTok users, causing concern among American users.

ByteDance said TikTok is working on a plan to better protect the data of its U.S. users.

The New York Times shared a letter that lays out a project called “Project Texas” to strengthen data security.

TikTok said 100 percent of user data in the U.S. is stored on Oracle servers in Texas, and it is working with Oracle to develop more advanced data security controls that will be finalized “in the near future.”

Additionally, TikTok plans to delete U.S. data from its servers and store the information exclusively at Oracle Corp. All data sharing outside the U.S. will be subject to “U.S. government-approved agreements and terms,” ​​the company said.

“The primary goal of the Texas Plan is to help build trust with users and key stakeholders by improving our systems and controls, but it is also making substantial progress toward compliance with a definitive agreement with the U.S. government that will adequately protect User data and U.S. national security interests.”

Adding to concerns about TikTok, BuzzFeed previously reported that TikTok engineers in China could see U.S. user data from September 2021 to January 2022.

The United States Federal Communications Commission asked Apple and Google earlier this week to remove TikTok from their app stores due to “the existence of a secret data operating mode”.

TikTok confirmed in the letter that some Chinese employees did have access to the data of U.S. TikTok users “under the supervision of the U.S. security team and subject to a series of robust cybersecurity controls.”

TikTok said it has an internal data classification system and approval process that assigns access levels based on the sensitivity of the data. It will work with the U.S. government to keep data safe.

In response to a question on why TikTok did not plan to block all U.S. user data, TikTok said “certain Chinese employees will have access to a small portion of TikTok’s U.S. user data that is not sensitive” to ensure global interoperability. Employees can also use U.S. data to develop a TikTok video recommendation algorithm, though training on the algorithm will be limited to Oracle’s servers.

TikTok promised that access would be “very limited” and would not involve “private information of TikTok US users.” TikTok said it was not required to provide data to the Chinese government, and it would not provide data if the CCP asked for it.

IT House learned that a member of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) said on June 30 that he had asked Apple and Google to remove TikTok from their respective app stores due to data security concerns. Apple and Google have yet to respond.

“US FCC members ask Apple, Google to remove TikTok from the app store”

“TikTok transfers US user data to Oracle’s local server”