Tiktok can be in serious trouble as it has been reported of tracking Android user data despite Google’s privacy protections.
TikTok is already in so much of trouble, the US government trying to push the app out of the country and this new report will increase TikTok’s trouble.
This latest speculation against TikTok comes after President Donald Trump issued an executive order last week that would effectively ban the app next month.
The Wall Street Journal has learned that TikTok’s app was tracking the MAC addresses (the hardware identifiers for networked devices) of Android users for at least 15 months despite Google policies and systems forbidding the practice. This practice was stopped in November last year.
TikTok used a loophole in security encryption to do this. The company didn’t notify TikTok users or give them a choice regarding the data collection.
TikTok bundled the MAC data with information including the semi-anonymous advertising ID used to track user behavior. You can reset the advertising ID on a phone, but you can’t change the MAC address. MAC address is your device’s physical address.
What is Android advertising ID
Android Advertising ID is a device identifier for advertisers to use in anonymously tracking user ad activity on Android devices. An Android Advertising ID is somewhat analogous to a third-party advertising cookie, in that it enables an advertiser to understand that a user of a particular phone has taken an ad action like a click or an app install.
What Next
AppCensus’ Joel Reardon said he filed a bug report with Google about the hole in June 2019, but the flaw was clearly exploitable past that point.
When asked to Google, they said they are investigating the report’s findings but they didn’t pass any comments on their security loophole.
When asked to TikTok, they said “We are committed to protecting the privacy and safety of the TikTok community. We constantly update our app to keep up with evolving security challenges. The current version of TikTok does not collect MAC addresses. We have never given any US user data to the Chinese government nor would we do so if asked. TikTok always encourages our users to download the most current version of TikTok.”
The US government is trying to push TikTok out of the nation. The only other alternative for TikTok to survive in the US is to sell itself to a US company. The timing of this leak is very bad for TikTok as they have almost no chance of surviving. Not only TikTok but even Google will have to answer some questions related to their security.