Texas Governor Greg Abbott has announced that his state will ban TikTok on all government-issued and personal devices used by government workers for work.
Update 8/2: A TikTok spokesperson told B&T that:
“We’re sorry to see the unintended consequences of these rushed TikTok bans—policies that will do nothing to advance cybersecurity— beginning to impact universities’ ability to share information, recruit students, and build communities around athletic teams, student groups, campus publications, and more.”
“The security risks associated with the use of TikTok on devices used to conduct the important business of our state must not be underestimated or ignored,” said Governor Abbott.
“Owned by a Chinese company that employs Chinese Communist Party members, TikTok harvests significant amounts of data from a user’s device, including details about a user’s internet activity.”
Each government agency has until 15 February to work out how it will enforce the state-wide ban.
The state has also outlined a plan to help the agencies along, consisting of four main points.
States must ban and prevent the download or use of TikTok and prohibited technologies on any state-issued device. They must prohibit employees or contractors from conducting state business on personal devices with TikTok.
Identify sensitive locations, meetings, or personnel within an agency that could be exposed to phones with TikTok. Phones with TikTok will be denied entry or use in these sensitive areas.
However, TikTok is not the only banned software. Anything from Kaspersky, ByteDance, Tencent, Alipay, CamScanner, QQ Wallet, SHAREit, VMate, WeChat, WeChat Pay, and WPS Office is also banned.
“Other prohibited technologies listed in the state-wide model plan also produce a similar threat to the security of Texans. It is critical that state agencies and employees are protected from the vulnerabilities presented by the use of this app and other prohibited technologies as they work on behalf of their fellow Texans,” continued Abbott.
“I thank the Texas Department of Public Safety and Texas Department of Information Resources for their hard work helping safeguard the state’s sensitive information and critical infrastructure from potential threats posed by hostile foreign actors.”
Plus any phones made by Huawei, ZTE, Hangzhou, Dahua, SZ DJI, and Hytera are also banned.
Whether this ban will actually be enforceable — particularly on personal devices used for government work. Interestingly, Governor Abbott issued an Executive Order in August 2021 that banned any government entity from mandating an employee get the COVID vaccine.