Ireland bans TikTok on government devices over cybersecurity concerns

Dublin: The Irish government has joined the countries that banned the use of TikTok on government devices out of concerns linked to cyber security.

On Friday, the state body responsible for advising the Irish government on cyber security recommended that staff and state agencies do not use the Chinese-owned app on official devices. The UK, the US, and other European Union member states have already barred TikTok.

The head of Ireland's National Cyber Security Centre said TikTok is on the "very high end, if not the highest end in terms of the amount of user data it collects". This created a risk due to the nature of Chinese intelligence-gathering law.

"The issue here is not what we know to be happening. The issue here rather is what we can't rule out is happening," NCSC director Richard Browne told national broadcaster RTE. "Once the risk exists in this kind of context, then it puts us in a situation where the logical argument is that we take a sensible risk-based approach and ensure that government data can't be compromised in this way," he added.

"There was no reason why politicians could not use the app on their private devices and that it could be used on official devices in exceptional cases where there is a business need, such as by a press office," stated NCSC.

TikTok is owned by the Chinese firm ByteDance. Several governments are concerned that the government of China is using the video-based social media app to collect users' data or advance its own interests. The company runs several of its European operations including data privacy and protection from Dublin. Last month, the company announced that it will be opening a second data centre in Ireland to reduce the transfer of data outside of the EU.