Rep. Michael Guest, R-Miss., has introduced legislation that would ban TikTok from Department of Homeland Security (DHS) devices.
The bill, entitled the ‘No TikTok on DHS Devices Act’, would prohibit DHS employees or contractors from downloading or using TikTok on any information technology issued by DHS. If the bill becomes law, DHS personnel would be given 60 days to remove the application from their devices.
“In today’s world, we cannot risk compromising important homeland security information to our foreign adversaries,” Rep. Guest said in a press release.
“Russia’s invasion of Ukraine could embolden the [Chinese Communist Party] CCP’s own expansionary goals,” the House member said. “In such a scenario, a security breach would be catastrophic to a U.S. response, which is why we must move to ban on DHS devices the use of apps that obtain data on their users and could make that information available to our adversaries. This is a common-sense step to close a potential tool of the CCP to spy on the U.S.”
The bill follows Biden Administration actions to readdress TikTok security issues. In June 2021 President Biden revoked a Trump-era order that attempted to hobble the use of Chinese-owned apps TikTok and WeChat in the U.S. At the same time, President Biden issued an executive order mandating a broad review of apps controlled by foreign adversaries to determine whether they pose a security threat to the U.S.
Since 2019, the Transportation Security Administration and several branches of the U.S. military have placed bans on the use of TikTok on U.S.-provided devices.
