The European Parliament elected to ban TikTok from all staff devices over cybersecurity concerns.
The popular Chinese short-form video-sharing app has now been shunned by the trifecta of EU institutions, with the parliament joining the European Commission and the EU Council in banning the app.
“In view of cybersecurity concerns, in particular regarding data protection and collection of data by third parties, the European Parliament has decided, in alignment with other institutions, to suspend as from 20 March 2023, the use of the TikTok mobile application on corporate devices,” the body said in a statement.
The ban does not apply to personal devices, but the parliament advised members and staff to remove TikTok from their own devices as well.
TikTok is owned by the Chinese firm ByteDance, which said the ban will hurt business confidence in Europe
“The EU claims to be the most open market in the world, but recently it has been taking restrictive measures and unreasonably suppressing other countries’ companies on the grounds of national security,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said at a daily briefing Wednesday.
The US has taken similar action against TikTok this week. The Biden administration ordered federal agencies to remove TikTok from all government-issued devices within 30 days.
Canada, for its part, also announced a ban on Monday applying to government devices.
Contact Andrew Kessel at andrew.kessel@proactiveinvestors.com
Follow him on Twitter @andrew_kessel