TikTok CEO Says Chinese Parent Company’s Stalking of US Journalists Not ‘Spying’

TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew testifies before the House Energy and Commerce Committee in the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill in Washington, on March 23, 2023. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

The CEO of TikTok claims that efforts by its China-based parent company to stalk American journalists do not qualify as “surveillance” or “spying.”

The comments referred to an ongoing Department of Justice investigation regarding how employees at the China-based ByteDance, which owns TikTok, illicitly used TikTok data to track American journalists without their knowledge.