Canada Pension Board Invests in TikTok’s Chinese Parent Firm; App Just Banned on Gov’t Devices Over Security Risks

A woman walks past a building belonging to ByteDance, the parent company of video-sharing app TikTok, in Beijing on Sept. 16, 2020. (Greg Baker/AFP via Getty Images)

The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board holds investments in ByteDance, the Chinese company whose TikTok video-sharing app was just banned on government-issued devices by Ottawa due to security concerns.

The pension board currently lists ByteDance under its holdings in the “Private Equity Asia” category on its website.

Canada’s ban of TikTok on federal government-issued devices announced on Feb. 27 comes on the heels of the European Commission and the European Union Council making a similar announcement for staff devices last week.

A screenshot from the website of CPP Investments showing Beijing Bytedance Technology as one of the companies the pension board is currently investing in. (CPP Investments/Screenshot via The Epoch Times)

The U.S. federal government and many U.S. states have also banned the app on government-issued devices. Democrat and Republican lawmakers in the United States are currently pursuing legislation to ban TikTok from operating in the country.

“Allowing the app to continue to operate in the U.S. would be like allowing the U.S.S.R. to buy up The New York Times, Washington Post, and major broadcast networks during the Cold War,” U.S. Rep. Mike Gallagher said in a statement as he introduced the bipartisan legislation on Feb. 17.

“No country with even a passing interest in its own security would allow this to happen, which is why it’s time to ban TikTok and any other CCP [Chinese Communist Party]-controlled app before it’s too late.”

FBI Director Christopher Wray last year told the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee that TikTok presents a significant national security concern.

“I would say that we do have national security concerns, at least from the FBI’s [perspective], about TikTok,” Wray said.

“They include the possibility that the Chinese government could use it to control data collection on millions of users or control the recommendation algorithm, which could be used for influence operations if they so chose, or to control software on millions of devices, which gives it opportunity to potentially technically compromise personal devices.”

The Epoch Times contacted the pension board for comment but didn’t hear back.

Other China Investments

Canada’s pension board is also heavily invested in Tencent, another Chinese internet giant. According to a 2019 report by iPolitics, MPs were told by the House of Commons cybersecurity team to stay away from Tencent’s flagship social media app, WeChat, due to security concerns.

The board owned around $1.2 billion in shares in Tencent as of March 2022.

A 2020 study by the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab said that communications on WeChat are “subject to pervasive content surveillance.”

“Documents and images transmitted entirely among non-China-registered accounts undergo content surveillance wherein these files are analyzed for content that is politically sensitive in China,” the study said.

The board has also been criticized in the past by human rights groups and parliamentarians for owning shares in companies in China that make video surveillance equipment used by the CCP to persecute Uyghurs.

Canada’s TikTok Ban

The federal government said on Feb. 27 it is banning the TikTok app on government-issued devices over concerns that its data collection methods leave users vulnerable to cyberattacks.

“The decision to remove and block TikTok from government mobile devices is being taken as a precaution, particularly given concerns about the legal regime that governs the information collected from mobile devices, and is in line with the approach of our international partners,” the Treasury Board said in a statement.

“On a mobile device, TikTok’s data collection methods provide considerable access to the contents of the phone.”

TikTok says the Canadian government didn’t cite specific security concerns and didn’t contact the company with questions prior to announcing the incoming ban.

“We are always available to meet with our government officials to discuss how we protect the privacy and security of Canadians, but singling out TikTok in this way does nothing to achieve that shared goal,” a TikTok spokesperson told The Epoch Times via email. “All it does is prevent officials from reaching the public on a platform loved by millions of Canadians.”

TikTok is also currently under investigation by Canada’s federal privacy commissioner as well as the privacy authorities of the provinces of Alberta, British Columbia, and Quebec.

Andrew Thornebrooke and Peter Wilson contributed to this report.