Anonymous has returned to the charge, now against the famous TikTok app, which he directly accuses of being used by China as a “spy weapon”
The group of hackers Anonymous has been in the eye of the hurricane for several months for several statements, such as the pedophile network subject to celebrities with Jeffrey Epstein.
And now, with just a few screenshots as evidence, Anonymous claims that TikTok, the most fashionable social network, is operated by the Chinese government to carry out mass espionage.
“Delete TikTok NOW,” was the message from the hackers. Anonymous posted screenshots of a Reddit user, who said he discovered that the app collects a lot of data, from network information to memory usage.
A guy on reddit reversed engineered #TikTok
Here’s what he found on the data it collects on you
It’s far worse than just stealing what’s on your clipboard: pic.twitter.com/oqaQyYDXT2
— Dan Okopnyi ?? (@d1rtydan) June 28, 2020
“If you know someone who is using it, explain that it is essentially a malicious program operated by the Chinese government that executes a massive espionage operation,” they added.
Delete TikTok now; if you know someone that is using it explain to them it is essentially malware operated by the Chinese government running a massive spying operation. https://t.co/J7N9FS7PvG
— Anonymous (@YourAnonCentral) July 1, 2020
TikTok has about 150,000 users in the former British colony, according to data from the company from last August.
Important companies in the sector such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter or Telegram have already announced that they will stop processing requests for data from their users by the Hong Kong security forces, while evaluating the impact of the security law.
The company has had to face accusations of maneuvering under the control of Beijing, so the company’s decision to stop operating in Hong Kong after the approval of the law would be due to an attempt to improve its image in this regard.
TikTok has ensured that it will never transfer user data to the Chinese authorities and that China has never requested any data from it either.
The popular video app announced that in the next few days it will cease to operate in Hong Kong after the entry into force of the new national security law that China has enacted for the territory.
“After the latest events, we have decided to end operations of the TikTok application in Hong Kong,” said a spokesperson for the social network, announcing that the program will no longer be available for download in Apple stores and Google coming soon.
So ByteDance, the Chinese company that owns TikTok, becomes the first Internet company to withdraw from Hong Kong after the new law was passed.
Hong Kong will be the second market for TikTok to stop working, having been blocked in India along with dozens of other Chinese applications.
United States Raises TikTok “Censor”
The Secretary of State of the United States, Mike Pompeo, announced that Washington is considering restricting the access of its citizens to this app.
A TikTok spokesperson said in a statement:
“TikTok is led by an American CEO, with hundreds of key employees and leaders in security, product and public policy here in the United States. We have no higher priority than promoting a secure application experience for our users. We have never provided user data to the Chinese government, nor would we if they asked us to. ”
Although it’s established that basically all the apps on your phone are getting your data, the US government and many of its allies have chosen to focus on TikTok specifically because it is owned by a China-based company, ByteDance.
CEO of ByteDance’s Chinese division, Zhang Nan, said today that the local version of TikTok, Douyin, will continue to work for HongKong users.
Although it is not available in app stores in Hong Kong and ByteDance has no plans at the moment to make it available, there are Hong Kong people who download it from mainland China and use it.
