It appears as if the issues surrounding tech giant TikTok never seem to end as the company is involved in another controversy.
This time around, it’s a bizarre yet alarming ordeal. Think along the lines of a UK-based journalist’s whereabouts being hunted down through her pet cat’s account on the social media platform.
The incident arose two days before the holiday for Christmas. And that’s when the platform called up Cristina Criddle to inform her how the firm’s own employees located in China and the US ended up viewing her details that were linked to her personal account.
They did not take any knowledge or any form of consent prior to that, and it was just a chilling and horrible ordeal. Let’s not forget how invasive that was, evading all the rules and regulations linked to privacy policies that the app takes great pride in.
What is even more interesting is how TikTok and ByteDance tend to brush away such reports as fake or false narratives but this time around, that was not going to happen. People had enough and it was time to bash those responsible. And in this case, journalist Cristina reported directly to the BBC so her story and points of view were not silenced and were going to be published as her truth.
So what does this mean, there’s a huge threat? Yes, that’s the case. The leading app confirmed how members that worked for the organization did indeed peek at her IP address and they ended up comparing it to the IP data of an unknown number of their staff. They wished to gain knowledge about who were the ones that were carrying out a meeting in secret conditions with the press.
The authority was misused and Cristina is furious because she has no clue about how long this has been taking place. Similarly, she had zero knowledge about how much information was given. By the looks of it, they knew everything including where and when she was going on holiday and that’s wrong because this was her personal details.
She feels violated as her intention was to do her job but what she got in return was chilling details about people knowing each and everything about her, all in the name of her feline pet.
The journalist’s real name and her details weren’t ever a part of the bio provided.
There were nearly 170 followers and in a span of just three years, she ended up adding 20 videos of Buffy and they were viewed several hundreds of times.
TikTok does like to grab onto details of its users including location, likes, which device is used, and the activity conducted outside of the app as well.
So many Western users’ information was not accessed or saved in China, the firm adds. And TikTok also justified by mentioning all those workers involved in this shady business of Cristina being tracked were also fired. They had similarly done this for other journalists from the West and TikTok said it could not save them for such misconduct.
Image DIW via MidJourney.
Read next: TikTok Enhances In-App Monetization With A Revamped Creator Fund And New Ad Product Where Publishers Get A 50% Share
This time around, it’s a bizarre yet alarming ordeal. Think along the lines of a UK-based journalist’s whereabouts being hunted down through her pet cat’s account on the social media platform.
The incident arose two days before the holiday for Christmas. And that’s when the platform called up Cristina Criddle to inform her how the firm’s own employees located in China and the US ended up viewing her details that were linked to her personal account.
They did not take any knowledge or any form of consent prior to that, and it was just a chilling and horrible ordeal. Let’s not forget how invasive that was, evading all the rules and regulations linked to privacy policies that the app takes great pride in.
What is even more interesting is how TikTok and ByteDance tend to brush away such reports as fake or false narratives but this time around, that was not going to happen. People had enough and it was time to bash those responsible. And in this case, journalist Cristina reported directly to the BBC so her story and points of view were not silenced and were going to be published as her truth.
So what does this mean, there’s a huge threat? Yes, that’s the case. The leading app confirmed how members that worked for the organization did indeed peek at her IP address and they ended up comparing it to the IP data of an unknown number of their staff. They wished to gain knowledge about who were the ones that were carrying out a meeting in secret conditions with the press.
The authority was misused and Cristina is furious because she has no clue about how long this has been taking place. Similarly, she had zero knowledge about how much information was given. By the looks of it, they knew everything including where and when she was going on holiday and that’s wrong because this was her personal details.
She feels violated as her intention was to do her job but what she got in return was chilling details about people knowing each and everything about her, all in the name of her feline pet.
The journalist’s real name and her details weren’t ever a part of the bio provided.
There were nearly 170 followers and in a span of just three years, she ended up adding 20 videos of Buffy and they were viewed several hundreds of times.
TikTok does like to grab onto details of its users including location, likes, which device is used, and the activity conducted outside of the app as well.
So many Western users’ information was not accessed or saved in China, the firm adds. And TikTok also justified by mentioning all those workers involved in this shady business of Cristina being tracked were also fired. They had similarly done this for other journalists from the West and TikTok said it could not save them for such misconduct.
Read next: TikTok Enhances In-App Monetization With A Revamped Creator Fund And New Ad Product Where Publishers Get A 50% Share
