On Friday morning, Amazon sent out a memo to its employees, asking them to uninstall the popular social media app TikTok off their phone. But a moment later, Amazon’s press office stated that the notice was sent out in error but gave no further explanation.
The company’s IT services department stated that the app has “security risks” as stated in the memo sent out; but specifics weren’t given. So on Fridays, the workers were asked to delete the app to enable them to keep mobile access to their work email. But the company’s spokesperson by Friday afternoon made a brief statement stating that the entire memo was a mistake. He concluded that there was no change to their policies concerning Tiktok.
Even the company’s director Kellie Green also sent out a memo to employees titled “disregard TikTok email’ Friday afternoon.
And the same language used by the spoke’s person was also used. Well, while the reason behind the TikTok memo was vague, but it didn’t just happen. The app, Tiktok, has been under some scrutiny, and it has been faced with an accusation of the Chinese’s government using it for spying.
Using the excuse of national security, last week India banned the app;while Australia and the US, are considering blocking Tiktok too. This issue has been taken with intelligence concerns by Chinese officials. But the truth is that if the Tiktok memo was sent out in error, this could be added to the company’s missteps its had in a chaotic year which will damage the corporate image for better execution.
The app, however, has been given cause for security concerns years back. Even in December Tiktok was banned from US army phones; the US senators in March proposed a bill that will block the app from all government devices. It was made known by a republican from Missouri, Sen. Josh Hawley in March that the app does gather user details while the app runs in the background.
The security professionals countered that and responded that other apps like Instagram, Facebook and Google maps do same.
