FBI Director Christopher Wray told Congress this week that he is “extremely concerned” Beijing could weaponize data collected through TikTok, the popular app owned by the Chinese company ByteDance.
During a House Homeland Security Committee hearing on worldwide threats Tuesday, Wray flagged the risk that the Chinese government could harness the video-sharing app to influence users or control their devices.
Wray said application programming interfaces, or APIs, that ByteDance embeds in the short-form video hosting are a national security concern because Beijing could use them to “control data collection of millions of users or control the recommendation algorithm, which can be used for influence operations.”
“China’s fast-hacking program is the world’s largest, and they have stolen more of Americans’ personal and business data than every other nation combined,” he said.
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According to Wray, the FBI has seen a surge in cybersecurity cases, and as the numbers have increased, so too has the complexity of the investigations.
“We’re investigating over 100 different ransomware variants and each one of those with scores of victims as well as a whole host of other novel threats posed by both cybercriminals and nation-states alike,” he said.
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Wray said APIs in TikTok could be yoked to control software on millions of devices, meaning the Chinese government could compromise personal devices owned by Americans.
Chinese cyber operations threaten the economic and national security of all Americans, said Rep. John Katko, D-N.Y., the committee’s ranking member. Katko told the committee ransomware attacks cost businesses an estimated $1.2 billion last year.
Natalie Neysa Alund covers trending news for USA TODAY. Reach her at [email protected] and follow her on Twitter @nataliealund.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: FBI director says TikTok poses US security threat, warns of China hack
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