ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Maryland will ban TikTok and some other Chinese and Russian-based platforms from being used in the state’s executive branch, Gov. Larry Hogan announced Tuesday, seeking to quash cybersecurity risks. presented by these platforms.
The Republican governor announced an emergency cybersecurity directive to ban the use of the platforms, alleging that they could be involved in cyber espionage, government surveillance and inappropriate collection of sensitive personal information.
“There may be no greater threat to our personal security and our national security than the cyber vulnerabilities that underpin our daily lives,” Hogan said in a statement. “To further protect our systems, we are issuing this emergency directive against foreign actors and organizations that seek to weaken and divide us.”
The Maryland directive was issued a week after South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem banned state employees and contractors from accessing TikTok on state devices, given its ties to China. For his part, South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster on Monday asked the state Department of Administration to ban the use of TikTok on all state devices it manages. Nebraska Governor Pete Ricketts blocked TikTok on state electronic devices in August 2020.
The US military has also banned the app on military devices.
“It’s a risk that most governments are beginning to realize is not worth taking,” said Holden Triplett, co-founder of Trenchcoat Advisors and a former FBI official who has worked in Beijing and in counterintelligence.
Although there has been much debate about whether the Chinese government is actively collecting data from TikTok, Triplett said the app poses a clear vulnerability. Because ByteDance, which owns TikTok, is a Chinese company, it would be obligated to comply with any possible requests from Chinese security and intelligence services to hand over data, which could include the location and contacts of employees, he explained.
ByteDance moved its headquarters to Singapore in 2020.
TikTok has struggled to spot ads with misinformation about the US election, according to a recent report from the nonprofit organization Global Witness and the Cybersecurity for Democracy team at New York University.
However, TikTok spokesman Jamal Brown said the concerns driving the bans “are fueled by misinformation about our company.”
“We are always happy to meet with state policy makers to discuss our privacy and security practices,” Brown said. “We are disappointed that many state agencies, offices and universities that have been using TikTok to build communities and connect with citizens will no longer have access to our platform.”
TikTok COO Vanessa Pappas, based in Los Angeles, has said that the company protects all American user information and that Chinese government officials do not have access to it.