Belgium Bans TikTok From Federal Government Work Phones (reuters.com) 21
Belgian federal government employees will no longer be allowed to use the Chinese-owned video app TikTok on their work phones, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said on Friday. From a report: De Croo said the Belgian national security council had warned of the risks associated with the large amounts of data collected by TikTok, which is owned by Chinese firm ByteDance, and the fact that the company is required to cooperate with Chinese intelligence services. "That is the reality," the prime minister said in a statement. "That's why it is logical to forbid the use of TikTok on phones provided by the federal government. The safety of our information must prevail." The European Commission and the European Parliament last month banned TikTok from staff phones due to growing concerns about the company, and whether China's government could harvest users' data or advance its interests.
Well, they surely... (Score:3, Funny)
...did not waffle on this decision.
Not sure why this is controversial (Score:4, Informative)
These are government phones. They are to be used for work purposes, not recording yourself sucking down two liters of Pepto Bismol and posting for the world to see.
Since it's not your phone the government can tell you what you can and can't do with them.
Re:Not sure why this is controversial (Score:5, Informative)
The real question is why aren't government phones locked down to begin with, with only a very specific set of approved apps installed?
Apple and Google (Score:1)
Control of the APP market is two players, who have banned apps for less.
And that is all one needs to know.
Re: (Score:2)
All the more reason to support open standards. Most things don't need to be an app. Use the website if one is available instead, or don't use it at all.
Thanks to PWAs, your website/app/game/whatever can act just like a native app, even work off-line. Naturally, Apple is the one holding this back, along with the rest of the web, but it's good enough on Android to use today for most apps.
It's trivial to ban an app from the app store. It's hard to ban a website.
feds (Score:2)
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>is almost always used in reference to the US
Um, no. I assume you are American? Well, I'm Canadian, and we DEFINETLY have a Federal government (and each province has their Provincial government).
In fact, about 40% of the world's population lives in federated countries. Neat, eh?
And I assure you, when those people use the words "the Feds" or "Federal government", they are usually referring to THEIR Feds, not yours.
Re: (Score:2)
'federal' refers to a federation of states and is almost always used in reference to the US
I would agree within the US that if you refer to "the federal government" or "the feds" or similar, 100% of people will understand that you are referring to "the one currently headed by Joe Biden." If you just say "federal" then even within the US "almost always" is simply untrue. The world has more than one federal republic in it, and believe it or not, while there is a shocking surplus of ignorant people, not every American is one.
Can't Have China Stealing (Score:2)
WHY THOUGH! (Score:2)
Why are federal government's work phones allowing users to install anything not directly sanctioned. How is it that government agencies are seemingly too incompetent to use basic mobile device management services which have been available for just shy of a decade now.
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The decision taken today is not only about phones owned by the government, but also private phones of government employees for which the government pays part of their subscription.
For phones owned by civil servants which are not sponsored by the government, there is only a "strong advise" to not install TikTok.
Do as i say and not as i do. (Score:2)
The Belgian Defense minister, in spite of the advice of her own administration, uses TikTok to broadcast herself dancing. Yeah, the Belgians have crappy ministers.