Pressure mounts for clarity on TikTok ban in government

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by Jacob Solomon Mar 20, 2023 News
Pressure mounts for clarity on TikTok ban in government

The federal government is under increasing pressure to clarify its position on the ban on Chinese social media platform TikTok.

As the government waits for the results of a Home Affairs probe into potential offshore data harvesting by TikTok, there is increasing behind-the-scenes frustration in sections of industry over which platforms are national security fit for marketing content and which are not.

Critical infrastructure providers who are loathe to get on the wrong side of the Home Affairs minister's occasional free post-incident corporate cybersecurity assessments that tend to hit board tables with the force of a judicial cane are the ones who have suffered the most.

Many critical infrastructure providers have stayed away from TikTok as a marketing platform, with banks like the Commonwealth Bank of Australia giving the viral content factory a chance.

Digital neobank Up has a TikTok presence as well.

John Howard is taking a break from helping Dominic Perrottet deliver a keynote address to help open the Australian Information Security Association's annual Cyber Conference on Tuesday.

Both the Albanese and previous Coalition governments have had run-ins with social media platforms over the last few years.

The review of the Privacy Act that could yet mandate local data storage to enforce Australian laws is a serious issue for public-facing agencies.

The Tech Council of Australia has been opposing onshoring as a fix for data exfiltration, setting the stage for a clash between traditional, IT industry players like HPE, Amazon Web Services and IBM and content and marketing-driven platforms like Apple.

Microsoft has invested heavily in Australia but largely avoided consumer social media plays in favor of snapping up LinkedIn, which is the preferred platform for espionage spearphishing and data harvesting.

The NewsGuard anti-disinformation ratings engine was launched in Australia.

NewsGuard said in a statement last week that its ratings and Nutrition Labels are licensed by browsers, news aggregations, education companies, and social media and search platforms.

If you purchase a subscription to NewsGuard, you will get access to NewsGuard's website ratings, as well as access to NewsGuard's browser extension for chrome. Through a license agreement with Microsoft, the extension is free to use.

It is a small price to pay to avoid stories about vaccine safety.

As for the rumour that Larry Ellison's Oracle Corporation, through which all of TikTok's US traffic is now routed, got its break on a Central Intelligence Agency database of the same name? That is correct.

Ellison and his shareholders are hoping that the demise of TikTok is gradual rather than a sudden end to the business.

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The reach of TikTok grew by millions.