Security Concerns – Amazon Ban Tic Tac Toe from Employee Phones – Various

Amazon, which employs about 840,000 employees worldwide, has asked employees to remove ticks from their phones because of potential security risks. Diversity Confirmed

In a memo on Friday, the company told employees that Tiktok, a short-form video app owned by Chinese Internet company ByteDance, should not be used on any device that could access Amazon’s email system. The New York Times first reported on Amazon’s ban on tickets.

“Due to security risks, the TickTock application is no longer permitted on mobile devices that access Amazon’s email,” the e-commerce giant said in the email. According to Amazon, employees have been allowed access to tickets through a web browser on the company’s laptop.

In a statement Diversity“Although Amazon has not contacted us before sending their emails, and we still do not understand their concerns, we welcome a dialogue so that they can resolve any issues and enable their team to continue our participation,” said a TickTock spokesperson. “We are proud that millions of American workers and contractors have returned to TickTock to entertain, inspire and connect with those who are at the forefront of this epidemic.”

The TickTock representative added, “User safety is of paramount importance to TickTock – we are fully committed to respecting the privacy of our users.”

Amazon’s PR team did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Earlier this week, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the U.S. government was looking at banning tickets – as well as other apps from Chinese companies – because of concerns that the Chinese government might gain access to private user information.

In response to Pompeo’s comments, Tiktok claimed that the company “never provided user data to the Chinese government, nor would we do so if asked.”

ByteDance has just hired Disney executive Kevin Mayer as TickTock’s CEO (and ByteDance’s COO), and in a recent webcast, Mayer acknowledged that TickTock has been given things by its Chinese parent agency. “There’s a lot of politics going on,” Mayer said during a Creative University webinar last month. “We are not really a Chinese company,” he claimed.

Amid border disputes between the two countries, the Indian government last week banned Tiktok and several thousand Chinese apps. Meanwhile, Tiktok has now disabled its app for Hong Kong users after China enacted a national security law that enhances the ability of government officials to monitor and block Internet content.

Separately, the U.S. Department of Justice and the FTC are currently investigating whether Tiktok continues to violate child-privacy laws. The FTC last year struck a deal under which Tiktok paid a 5.7 million fine and pledged to comply with the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). But this spring, 20 advocacy groups have complained that Tiktok is still breaking the law.