New York City Bans TikTok on Government-Owned Devices

New York City on Wednesday joined a wave of states and federal businesses in banning TikTok from government-owned units primarily based on safety issues, snuffing out some well-liked city-run TikTok accounts within the course of.

Jonah Allon, a spokesman for Mayor Eric Adams, mentioned in an announcement that the town’s Cyber Command decided that the app “posed a security threat to the city’s technical networks.” City businesses should take away the app inside 30 days and workers will lose entry to TikTok and its web site from city-owned units and networks.

The TikTok accounts of Mr. Adams, the town’s Department of Sanitation and the Department of Parks and Recreation all up to date their bios with this message: “This account was operated by NYC until August 2023. It’s no longer monitored.”

Numerous authorities officers have been limiting entry to TikTok in response to issues that the app, which is owned by the Chinese firm ByteDance, might give Beijing entry to delicate person knowledge. New York State has banned TikTok on state-issued cellular units for greater than three years, with some exceptions.

The bans have largely been restricted to official units, although Montana just lately handed a invoice barring TikTok throughout the state. That rule, which is about to take impact on Jan. 1, is being challenged by TikTok on a number of grounds, together with accusations that it violates the First Amendment.

TikTok declined to touch upon the ban, which was earlier reported by The Verge.

The metropolis’s Department of Sanitation has develop into an surprising TikTok darling, amassing practically 50,000 followers with movies highlighting its staff and memes tied to new trash-collection instances. New York journal’s Curbed website praised the account final yr, saying that the division “comes across in its TikToks as a bunch of genuine, hardworking salt-of-the-earth folks.” The account bought one other enhance final yr when a declaration from Jessica Tisch, the town’s sanitation commissioner, went viral on TikTok: “The rats are absolutely going to hate this announcement. But the rats don’t run this city, we do.”

While some TikTok viewers might grieve the lack of such accounts, they will nonetheless watch Empire State-related fare on @NYGov, the official TikTok account for New York State, which just lately riffed off the latest “girl dinner” development with a video extolling a “New York State girl dinner” of pizza, Hudson Valley cheese, Tate’s cookies and bagels.

Michael Gold contributed reporting.