Chinese government has a “kill switch” that could shut down apps
Yintao Yu, former head of engineering for the U.S. operations of ByteDance, parent company of TikTok, has accused the Chinese company of pursuing a “culture of lawlessness.” The company, as he has defined it, is a “useful propaganda tool for the Chinese Communist Party.” and claims it stole content from competitors like Snapchat and Instagram in its early years.
The claims he has made in. a lawsuit for wrongful dismissal by the firm where he worked from 2017 to 2018. The former employee believes he was fired for voicing concerns about a “worldwide scheme” the brand was following to steal and profit from rival firms’ intellectual property.
Most notable in the lawsuit is the claim that ByteDance has a special unit with members of the Chinese Communist Party that “guided how the company promoted core communist values.” In addition, as it recounts, said committee had a “kill switch” that to turn off apps. and “supreme access of all company data, including that stored in the United States.”
If what he points out is true, the suspicions voiced months ago by the US government about the Chinese authorities’ control over TikTok would make sense. In fact, Christopher Wray, director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, noted that the app “screams with national security concerns,” and. several states in the country have already banned the platform on government devices.. However, ByteDance stressed at the time that China did not control user information outside the country.
ByteDance’s official statements
Faced with the accusations of its former head of engineering in the U.S., the company that owns TikTok has given its version: “We plan to strongly oppose what we believe that Are unsubstantiated assertions and allegations in this complaint.“.
The brand recalls that Yu worked for less than a year and details that, in that time, was in charge of an app called Flipagramwhich was discontinued years ago for “business reasons”.
In addition, they have taken the opportunity to highlight. their commitment to “respect the intellectual property of other companies.” and to explain that the data they acquire is acquired “in accordance with industry practices” and their global policy.
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