TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew is set to testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Thursday. If there’s anyone left in Congress or the American public who hasn’t made up their minds about the ultra-popular short-form app, the executive will attempt to sway them to his side.
The app is already banned on government devices, and President Joe Biden has threatened to ban TikTok nationwide if ByteDance doesn’t sell it to a non-Chinese entity. Since the Trump administration, the American government has been threatening to ban TikTok. The app is owned by ByteDance, a tech company based in Beijing, and by law the Chinese Communist Party could force the app to hand over American user data—something which Chew will vehemently deny during his opening remarks. There are also questions about whether the app could be used to spread Chinese or anti-American propaganda, and many critics argue that TikTok is dangerous for children and teenagers.
In his prepared statement, released Wednesday and posted below, Chew will argue that TikTok already addressed these concerns. Chew lays out more details about so called “Project Texas,” a plan where TikTok is partnering with an American tech company, Oracle, to house American user data on servers in the US, where the information will be siloed to keep it out of the hands of the Chinese government. Chew also says that children and teenagers are treated to special protections on TikTok, both in terms of the content they see and how data is collected.
But he’ll also make a broader argument. Chew is trying to make the case that TikTok is essential to American small businesses and free speech, and that it’s too important to the app’s reported 150 million US users to ban.
TikTok’s Chew is quieter than his counterparts at other tech platforms. Where Mark Zuckerberg is the key spokesperson for Meta and Elon Musk is essentially the only person who ever speaks for Twitter, Chew has courted the public eye far less. After tomorrow, TikTok will have a public face for the first time.
Discover Samsung!Each day this week, Samsung highlights their bestsellers with 24-hour deals and four-hour flash sales.
Chair Rodgers, Ranking Member Pallone, and Members of the Committee:
Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to talk about TikTok and our mission to inspire creativity and bring joy to more than 1 billion people worldwide. I look forward to discussing what makes TikTok so special to the diverse audiences it serves, as well as our efforts to promote minor safety, data privacy, and platform security. I also welcome the chance to update you about our efforts to develop cutting-edge, multi-pronged initiatives to address national security concerns.
My name is Shou Chew, and I am the Chief Executive Officer of TikTok. I am responsible for all of TikTok’s business operations and our strategic direction worldwide. A third-generation Singaporean, I am a graduate of University College of London and Harvard Business School. I am a veteran of the Singapore Armed Forces, a husband, and a father, and I currently reside in Singapore with my wife and two children.
Long before I became CEO, I was a content creator, and I have seen firsthand the transformative capability of short-form video. I am passionate about TikTok’s ability to brighten people’s lives, introduce them to new ideas and interests, and help businesses connect to their audiences.
On TikTok, we aim to provide three things. The first is a window to discover. This window, the For You feed, opens to a stream of videos curated to your interests, making it easy to find content and creators you love. The second is a canvas to create. Whether it’s demonstrating a new science experiment or the latest cooking trend, people around the world use TikTok to unleash creativity. The third is a bridge to connect. Through TikTok, people have discovered new communities, cultures, and interests. As an example, BookTok, with more than 100 billion views, has connected readers across the globe and changed the way people consume literature. Although some people may still think of TikTok as a dancing app for teenagers, the reality is that our platform and our community have become so much more for so many.
TikTok has empowered millions of Americans to express their voices in their own authentic way and has provided a global stage for their creativity in a way that cannot be replicated on any other platform or in any other medium. More than 150 million people in the United States use TikTok on a monthly basis, with the average user today being an adult well past college age. Their videos provide a lens through which the rest of the world can experience American culture. Examples include TikTok’s role in bringing exposure to American musicians, artists, chefs, and many more. While users in the United States represent 10 percent of our global community, their voice accounts for 25 percent of the total views around the world.
In addition to being a destination to express creativity, we pride ourselves on being a platform that helps companies—many of them small businesses—thrive. These are businesses like Country Lather Soap Works in Perkinston, Mississippi. Country Lather Soap Works is a no-frills producer of handcrafted soaps and bath products located on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Founder Jessie Whittington had been making soap as a hobby for years before sharing her passion on TikTok while furloughed from her job as a bus driver. In a short time, sales exploded and she was shipping her products across the country, allowing her to quit her 9-to-5 and realize her dream of running her own small business.
TikTok enabled many small businesses to weather the darkest days of the pandemic, and a recent study found that an overwhelming majority of small businesses view TikTok as both fun and easy to use. TikTok’s Small Business Resource Center helps people leverage the power and creativity of TikTok to grow their brands and better connect with their audience. If you talk to the millions of people and businesses who are on TikTok, I believe you’ll hear incredibly powerful stories of discovery, creation, and connection that contribute to people’s livelihoods and well-being.
Although I could talk all day about how TikTok enriches people’s lives, I am also here to address concerns that have been raised by some members of this Committee. I know that trust is something that is earned through action, not words, and I welcome the opportunity to discuss not only our commitments, but also tangible evidence from TikTok’s efforts to become a leader in safety and security.
Having met with a number of members of the Committee in recent weeks, the concerns that I have heard fall primarily into four categories: minor safety, data privacy and security, real-world harms from online activities, and the risk of foreign content manipulation. I would like to address each of these in turn. After that, I will compare some myths about TikTok to reality, including with regard to perceived foreign influence. First, however, I want to take a moment to highlight TikTok’s commitment to an open and transparent relationship with Congress generally and this Committee specifically.
There are more than 150 million Americans who love our platform, and we know we have a responsibility to protect them, which is why I’m making the following commitments to you and our users:
1) We will keep safety—particularly for teenagers—a top priority for us;
2) We will firewall protected U.S. user data from unauthorized foreign access;
3) Tiktok will remain a platform for free expression and will not be manipulated by any government;
4) We will be transparent and give access to third-party independent monitors, to remain accountable for our commitments.
Although this is my first time testifying before Congress, TikTok has long considered Congress an important stakeholder, and we have engaged actively with this Committee and others. TikTok routinely and voluntarily provides documents, briefings, and testimony to congressional committees.
For instance, over the past several months, TikTok has provided four briefings to the bipartisan staffs of this Committee and the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability on issues including data access and security. We also separately briefed this Committee in January on our efforts related to minor safety. Through these briefings, TikTok has answered questions about our robust policies and the improvements that we have made and will continue to make to even further strengthen our capabilities. Because we value Congress’s important oversight role, we regularly provide documents and information well beyond our legal obligations. We look forward to continuing to engage in a transparent and productive dialogue with this Committee and others.
TikTok’s engagement with Congress is emblematic of our broader approach to transparency. Every quarter, we release a Community Guidelines Enforcement Report. These reports contain detailed information about the type and volume of content we remove. Twice a year, we also disclose data about requests we receive from law enforcement or governments.
Additionally, we are developing platform research and content moderation ApplicationProgramming Interfaces (APIs) as part of our commitment to bringing transparency to how our platform operates. As of last month, we have launched a research API that allows U.S.-based academic researchers to more easily analyze public content posted to the platform.
We provide detailed information about our content moderation process and recommendation system in our Transparency and Accountability Center. After offering virtual tours during the pande Source: Gizmodo