Aruna Sharma, Global Head of Privacy & Regulation
At TikTok, protecting the privacy and security of people using our platform is one of our top priorities. Today we celebrate Data Privacy Day and kick off Privacy Awareness Month by remembering some of our efforts over the past year, including:
- We continue to strengthen our data sovereignty efforts by establishing an organization called TikTok US Data Security (USDS) dedicated to overseeing all data and content-related aspects of the US-based TikTok platform. In addition, we shared more details on TikTok’s approach to protecting European user data and further minimizing data transfer outside the region. This includes our previously announced intention to establish a data center in Dublin to store UK and EEA data in 2023.
- Providing more transparency on how our platform works by research API development and work with the research community while maintaining the privacy of our community. These APIs are currently being tested by members of our Content and Security Advisory Board who are experienced with disinformation, violent extremism, hate behavior, and new technologies.
- Updates to our privacy policy in Europe and the US to be more transparent.
- Creation #BeCyberSmart series, A collection of posts promoting best practices for online data security and protecting your digital footprint. Topics included recommendations related to information about PIN codes, site verificationand data backup privacy control guidepassword management, the importance of two-factor authentication, and app updates plus much more.
- Launch of “Privacy Highlights for Teens in the EU”, an easier to understand and simplified new page designed to better inform young users about data privacy and feature privacy, the data we collect and how we can use it.
- Celebrating our two year anniversary with HackerOne by encouraging ethical hackers to disclose vulnerabilities so we can quickly fix them before impacting our community. In addition to partnering with HackerOne through our bug bounty program, we became a founding sponsor in 2022 HackerOnea Corporate Security Commitment (CSecR) that holds transparency, collaboration, innovation and differentiation as core principles to help create a safer digital world for all.
- Update of our Community Principles to further support the well-being of our community and the integrity of the platform. We have continued to emphasize the importance of transparency in our user community and have identified the types of behavior and content that are unacceptable.
- We continue to expand our Privacy By Design program. Privacy By Design is an internal initiative that puts privacy first, allowing us to build privacy into products and features for our platform throughout the development lifecycle.
In 2023, we will continue to scale up these efforts. We will continue to report future updates and innovations to enhance user privacy.