Two senators call for FTC probe into TikTok over U.S. data access

WASHINGTON: The U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee chair and top Republican have called on the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to investigate social media app TikTok and Chinese parent ByteDance due to “repeated misrepresentations” over its handling of U.S. data.

The request on Tuesday from Senator Mark Warner, a Democrat, and Republican Marco Rubio followed a Buzzfeed report saying the short video app permitted TikTok engineers and executives in China to repeatedly access private data of U.S. users. The senators said such access raised questions over TikTok’s claims to lawmakers and users that the data was protected.