TikTok CEO Kevin Mayer was accused of being an “American puppet” for working for a Chinese-owned social media app by White House trade advisor Peter Navarro.
ByteDance appointed former Disney executive, Kevin Mayer, as TikTok CEO earlier this year. His goal was to reinstill trust with regulators.
Navarro tagged Mayer as an “American puppet," claiming that the strategy of putting a US citizen as head of the company is “not going to work.”
“If TikTok, if it separates as an American company, that doesn’t help us because ... we’re going to have to give China billions of dollars for the privilege of having TikTok operate on US soil,” Navarro said.
In an interview with Fox Business on Sunday, Navarro also accused Chinese apps for collecting data on American users and sending them over to Beijing.
Navarro reiterated the accusations of the US government against TikTok and other Chinese apps. He believes that President Donald Trump will take a “strong action” on TikTok and other Chinese apps.
Security threat
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said earlier this month that the US government plans to ban TikTok because it is deemed a security threat.
He said the company is sharing users’ information with the Chinese government. Fox’s Laura Ingraham asked him if he would recommend people to download the app. “Only if you want your private information in the hands of the Chinese Communist Party,” he said.
“What the American people have to understand is all the data that goes into those mobile apps that kids have so much fun with and seem so convenient, it goes right to servers in China, right to the Chinese military, the Chinese Communist Party, and the agencies that want to steal our intellectual property,” Navarro said.
“Those apps can be used to steal personal and financial information for blackmail and extortion, they can be used to steal business intellectual property and proprietary secrets,” he added.
The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology was not able to provide a comment on the issue.
Navarro mentioned another Chinese app called WeChat, which is owned by technology giant Tencent and considered the biggest messaging app in China.
“TikTok and WeChat are the biggest forms of censorship on the Chinese mainland, and so expect strong action on that,” he said.
TikTok's response
In response to Navarro’s comments, a TikTok representative emphasized that the company prioritizes the privacy of its users’ data.
“Our Chief Information Security Officer has decades of industry and US law enforcement experience. TikTok’s parent is a privately owned company backed by some the best-known US investors, which hold four of its five board seats,” a TIkTok representative told CNBC.
“TikTok is enjoyed by users throughout the world, but the app is not even available in China. As we have said repeatedly, we have never shared TikTok user data with the Chinese government, and would not do so if asked. Period.”
Tencent declined to further comment.
