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Access to TikTok may soon be limited in Louisiana

10 months 2 weeks 6 days ago Tuesday, May 09 2023 May 9, 2023 May 09, 2023 6:03 PM May 09, 2023 in News
Source: WBRZ
BATON ROUGE- 150 million Americans log in and use TikTok every month. That number may quickly decrease as lawmakers ban the app.
"Some politicians have started talking about banning TikTok. This would take TikTok away from all 150 million of you" CEO of TikTok, Shou Chew said in a video.
"The intelligence committee has stated that TikTok is a serious threat to the us nation intelligence," State Representative Daryl Deshotel of Avoyelles Parish said.
Concerns about access to data has prompted some states to limit access and that could soon be the case here in Louisiana. House Bill 361 is now headed to the house floor.
"Other technology and cyber security experts have stated that the app tracks users keyboard entries,"  Deshotel said.
State lawmakers are working to pass a bill that would ban TikTok on state owned devices and state controlled WiFi. Their fear, Chinese government obtaining users data and accessing government information.
"There's a lot of things as a state employee you can't do. Prohibiting them from doing that would be the most responsible and cost effective thing to do," Rep. Zeringue said during the committee meeting on Tuesday.
The ban could affect major universities. Students and staff at LSU, for instance, would be unable to use TikTok when connected to campus WiFi. 
"Honestly LSU WiFi is not reliable so I use my phone data anyway, so that wouldn't make a difference to me," LSU student Emma Vines said.
Some students say they're not concerned about who may be doing what, with data that can be accessed through TikTok.
"If people want to create content and post it, they should be allowed to," Vines said.
Thirty-three other states have passed some type of ban into law. At this time, there is no public evidence that U.S. data is being collected or used by Beijing officials. 

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