Mike Pompeo: “If you care about your children and grandchildren, get TikTok off their phones”

Mike Pompeo, former director of the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and former Secretary of State. REUTERS/Brian Snyder

Mike Pompeo, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States (CIA) and former Secretary of State, recommended this Thursday on his Twitter account that parents delete the TikTok application from the phones of their children and grandchildren. The request comes as the Chinese tech company faces an uncertain year in the US after Democrats and Republicans demanded strict surveillance of the popular video-sharing app.

“If you care about your children and grandchildren, get TikTok off their phones. Just delete it. Trust me, they’ll thank you later,” Pompeo wrote on Twitter.

Owned by Chinese tech giant ByteDance, TikTok has become a headache for American conservatives, who allege that the app downloaded by millions of young Americans can be spoofed for espionage or propaganda purposes by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

The Democratic Party also joined the wave of criticism against the application, for which the president of the United States, Joe Biden, signed a new law at the end of 2022 that prohibits the use of TikTok on mobile devices provided by the government. The law also prohibits the use of the application in the United States House of Representatives and Senate.

“TikTok is the digital equivalent of fentanyl,” said Republican lawmaker Mike Gallagher, one of the leading anti-China voices in Congress, comparing the app to the deadly opioid.

“It’s highly addictive and destructive, and we’re seeing worrying data about the corrosive impact of constant social media use, particularly on young men and women here in the United States,” he told NBC News.

“We have to ask ourselves if we want the Chinese Communist Party to control what is about to become the most powerful media company in America,” Gallagher told NBC.

The new rule is the latest in a series of moves by US governments to ban TikTok, owned by Beijing-based ByteDance Ltd.

In total, 19 states have already blocked, at least partially, the app on state-managed devices for fear that the Chinese regime could use it to track Americans and censor content.

The $1.66 trillion funding bill, passed last week to fund the US government through September 30, 2023, includes a provision to ban the app on federally managed devices, and it will take effect once President Joe Biden signs it into law.

In addition, in the United States, Washington public schools filed a lawsuit against Meta, Snapchat, YouTube and TikTok, accusing them of “harming” the mental health of young people. At the same time, President Biden urged Democrats and Republicans to “unite against the abuses” of big technology for data processing and addiction that can generate.

FILE – The TikTok logo is displayed on a cell phone screen in Boston on Oct. 14, 2022. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer, File)

The criticism has even spread to other Western countries. French President Emmanuel Macron last month accused the Chinese social network of censoring content and fostering Internet addiction among young people.

The popular social network has spent months trying to reach a long-term agreement with the US government through the secret Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS).

The reports revealed that TikTok and the Biden administration were about to announce a long-term agreement that would have defined strict safeguards for US user data.

Brooke Oberwetter, a spokesperson for TikTok, stated: “The solution that CFIUS is considering is a comprehensive package of measures with layers of independent governance and oversight… far beyond what any other similar company is doing today.”

But this deal has been stalled amid public criticism from FBI Director Christopher Wray, who has said he continues to view TikTok as a threat to national security.

Wray warned last month that the Chinese had the ability to control the app’s algorithm, leaving American users vulnerable to a government “that doesn’t share our values, and that has a mission that is very at odds with what it is in the best interest of the United States.”

TikTok strongly denied that the Chinese government has any such controls.

Keep reading:

Joe Biden urged Democrats and Republicans to “unite against the abuses” of big tech TikTok: how social media is affecting youth mental health The Biden administration revealed the six principles for reform of the tech giants

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