Democrat member of Congress and Ohio Senate candidate Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH) continues to ask his constituents to follow him on communist China’s TikTok despite security warnings from the House of Representatives Chief Administrative Office, and despite him pushing a “tough on China” message in his Ohio senate campaign.
Rep. Ryan, who is running against Republican J.D. Vance for the Senate, was one of the earliest adopters of TikTok in the House, and has one of the largest followings of any member of Congress. Despite security warnings, he continues to advertise his account to constituents on his official congressional Twitter account.
Tim Ryan supports TikTok (screenshot)
According to Politico, the House Chief Administrative Office sent a two-page memo to House employees Tuesday warning them against downloading or using TikTok, due to security and privacy concerns.
Shouzi Chew, chief executive officer of TikTok Inc., during an interview for an episode of “The David Rubenstein Show: Peer-to-Peer Conversations” at the TikTok office in New York, U.S., on Thursday, Feb. 17, 2022. ByteDance Ltd.’s TikTok has emerged as the top challenger to the social media dominance of Meta Platforms Inc., the parent company of Facebook and Instagram. Photographer: Christopher Goodney/Bloomberg
The memo warns members of Congress against downloading the app, highlighting its publicly stated data collection policies.
From the memo:
TikTok policy has stated that it automatically collects information about users’ devices, including location data based on your SIM card and IP addresses and GPS, your use of TikTok itself and all the content you create or upload, the data you send in messages on its app, metadata from the content you upload, cookies, the app and file names on your device, battery state and even your keystroke patterns and rhythms, among other things.
While Ryan continues to make use of TikTok and advertise it on his official government account, he is pushing tough-on-China messages in his campaign for Ohio Senate.
“China is out-manufacturing us left and right and it’s time we fight back,” says Rep. Ryan in one ad.
The anti-China ad was the first TV ad of Ryan’s campaign, establishing his stance on China as a core theme of his run for Senate, even while the Ohio congressman continues to cheerlead for TikTok.
Breitbart News has reached out to Rep. Ryan’s office for comment.
Allum Bokhari is the senior technology correspondent at Breitbart News. He is the author of #DELETED: Big Tech’s Battle to Erase the Trump Movement and Steal The Election.
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