Norwegian Justice Minister Emilie Enger Mehl, herself very active on TikTok, which has brought her backlash, on Tuesday advised the country’s officials not to install the Chinese application on their professional devices.
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This recommendation, which reflects several orders or even bans issued in the West, is motivated by fears of espionage and also applies to the Russian-origin encrypted messaging system Telegram.
“In their risk assessment (…) the secret services identify Russia and China as the main risk factors for the interests of Norwegian security,” the minister said, as quoted in a press release.
“They also point to social media as an arena for risky actors and others who want to influence us through misinformation and fake news,” she added.
The recommendation applies to all professional devices of officials that are connected to the digital systems of their administrations.
The youngest member of government, Ms. Mehl, 29, had been in the storm herself last fall: under fire from questions from the press and opposition, after a long silence she had admitted to having TikTok installed on his feature phone, noting that he had the App deleted a month later.
She justified this use by appealing to a young audience, with whom the application is extremely popular.
TikTok and Telegram can still be used by civil servants with professional justification, but on devices that are not connected to the digital systems of the administration, the ministry specified.
For their part, the United States, the European Commission and the United Kingdom have banned TikTok on working devices.
TikTok admitted in November that some employees in China were able to access European user data, and in December admitted that employees had used that data to track journalists.
But the group fiercely denies any Chinese government control or access to its data.