Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) is pressing the U.S. Treasury Department to conduct a thorough review of new whistleblower allegations regarding the Chinese-owned video app TikTok that were recently brought to his attention.
Hawley said that a TikTok whistleblower has come to him with direct knowledge that the app’s access controls might be weaker than previously suggested. The allegations are “deeply concerning” and appear to contradict public statements from senior executives of TikTok and its Beijing-based parent company, ByteDance, over the handling of U.S. users’ data, he said in a letter dated March 8 to Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen.
