Colorado U.S. Senator Michael Bennet called on Apple CEO Tim Cook and Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai to remove TikTok from their app stores immediately given its unacceptable risk to U.S. national security. 

“Like most social media platforms, TikTok collects vast and sophisticated data from its users, including faceprints and voiceprints. Unlike most social media platforms, TikTok poses a unique concern because Chinese law obligates ByteDance, its Beijing-based parent company, to ‘support, assist, and cooperate with state intelligence work,’” wrote Bennet.  

In the letter, Bennet highlights the danger of TikTok’s extensive reach in the United States. TikTok is now the third-most popular social media app in the U.S. with more than 100 million American users, who spend an average of more than 80 minutes per day on the app. Bennet describes how the combination of TikTok’s reach, aggressive data collection, and obligations under Chinese law threaten U.S. security. 

“Beijing’s requirement raises the obvious risk that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) could weaponize TikTok against the United States, specifically, by forcing ByteDance to surrender Americans’ sensitive data or manipulate the content Americans receive to advance China’s interests,” continued Bennet in the letter. “No company subject to CCP dictates should have the power to accumulate such extensive data on the American people or curate content to nearly a third of our population.” 

Bennet goes on to describe a troubling pattern of behavior at TikTok and ByteDance, including past efforts to limit content critical of the CCP and disseminate pro-Chinese propaganda to American audiences. 

“Last year, Congress recognized the unacceptable security risks from TikTok and banned it from all federal government devices. At least 27 state governments have also passed full or partial bans on the app. Given these grave and growing concerns, I ask that you remove TikTok from your respective app stores immediately,” concluded Bennet. 

Bennet is a leading voice in Congress urging common-sense policy to hold powerful digital platforms accountable to the public interest. On Sunday, Bennet will deliver the keynote address at Silicon Flatirons, Colorado Law’s flagship conference on “The Internet’s Midlife Crisis.” Bennet will describe the vast and unchecked power of Big Tech over American democracy and society and call for reasserting the public interest through common-sense rules and oversight.  

Last year, Bennet introduced the Digital Platform Commission Act, first-of-its-kind legislation to establish an expert federal body empowered to provide comprehensive, sector-specific regulation and oversight of digital platforms to protect consumers, promote competition, and defend the public interest.  

In December, Bennet helped pass the Children and Media Research Advancement Act, which directs the National Institutes of Health and Department of Health and Human Services to research technology’s effects on child development. In July 2020, Bennet and then-Senator Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) urged Facebook to heed recommendations of a civil rights audit of the company’s policies and practices by strengthening efforts to protect civil rights, remove hate speech, and combat voter suppression on its platforms. Earlier that year, Bennet wrote to Facebook urging it to assume greater responsibility for the damage its platforms have caused to democratic values around the world, citing examples from Brazil, the European Union, the Philippines, and Myanmar.