With U.S.-China relations strained, a social media app has become the latest point of contention.
TikTok, a popular video app owned by a Chinese company, is facing a ban by the Trump Administration for spying on Americans. And Mark Grabowski, a cyber law professor at Adelphi University, has become a go-to source for media outlets.
"TikTok is Chinese government malware masquerading as a social media app. It goes without saying, you should delete it if it's on your phone," Grabowski said.
He was quoted in the Washington Examiner, The Inquisitr and the Epoch Times, among other news outlets.
Grabowski explained: "In addition to all the data and personal information about users TikTok collects from the app itself, it can access your camera, microphone, saved photos and videos, contacts, location and probably also data from other apps such as your web browsing history. In fact, the app collects way more data than it needs to.
"For example, it's odd that TikTok does GPS tracking since TikTok videos don’t display location information. People who have reverse engineered it have also discovered that its code is bloated, allowing it to do things it does not need to do to function, such as downloading and executing remote zip files. And all the data collected by the app is encrypted in a way that makes it impossible to know what's being sent back to TikTok."
TikTok, a popular video app owned by a Chinese company, is facing a ban by the Trump Administration for spying on Americans. And Mark Grabowski, a cyber law professor at Adelphi University, has become a go-to source for media outlets.
"TikTok is Chinese government malware masquerading as a social media app. It goes without saying, you should delete it if it's on your phone," Grabowski said.
He was quoted in the Washington Examiner, The Inquisitr and the Epoch Times, among other news outlets.
Grabowski explained: "In addition to all the data and personal information about users TikTok collects from the app itself, it can access your camera, microphone, saved photos and videos, contacts, location and probably also data from other apps such as your web browsing history. In fact, the app collects way more data than it needs to.
"For example, it's odd that TikTok does GPS tracking since TikTok videos don’t display location information. People who have reverse engineered it have also discovered that its code is bloated, allowing it to do things it does not need to do to function, such as downloading and executing remote zip files. And all the data collected by the app is encrypted in a way that makes it impossible to know what's being sent back to TikTok."
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