Adding to the top of several allegations TikTok is facing, a former employee of the social media is now saying that TikTok’s Project Texas has a major flaw.
Project Texas is an initiative to safeguard the data of US users, which should address the senators’ concern that none (including China) can access that user data. But, the new whistleblowing incident reveals that Project Texas will link TikTok to Toutiao, a news app from ByteDance – effectively opening a spying channel for the Chinese.
Severe Flaws in Project Texas
TikTok is already having a bunch of allegations laid against it. From user privacy to platform security, the short-video entertainment platform is alleged by several nations around the world. Now, adding to this list is an allegation from an ex-employee – who says that the company’s Project Texas is severely flawed.
Talking to The Washington Post, the self-proclaimed whistleblower from TikTok’s Trust and Safety team says that Project Texas has serious flaws – as it will link TikTok to Toutiao, a popular news app from ByteDance. The link would essentially let the Chinese spy on US user data, claims the whistleblower.
Project Texas is a $1.5 billion initiative from TikTok to safeguard US user data – formed after several senates have raised concerns about their natives’ data security. Though TikTok continues to deny the Chinese government requests for data processing, it’s still blamed for similar reasons.
Responding to the whistleblower’s allegations, unnamed people at TikTok told The Post that the claims are “unfounded” and the Toutiao code in Project Texas only amounts to a “naming convention and technical relic” that doesn’t tie the app to China.
Further, the routing of US data to Oracle servers should undercut the assertion that Toutiao could affect TikTok’s US business, says the source. Also, the whistleblower in question was only employed for half a year and he left months before Project Texas was finalized. This may state that he may not know much about the project before it took off.
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