Users report issues with TikTok as the app reflects problems from a data center outage. Concerns about censorship grow among users.
The timing of these outages comes after the U.S. created a separate TikTok business last week. This decision was made because of worries about the Chinese government accessing user data through the app’s old owner, ByteDance. Now, ByteDance has less than 20% of the new TikTok USDS Joint Venture. Other companies like Oracle and Silver Lake also own parts of it.
The TikTok USDS Joint Venture said there was a power outage at a U.S. data center. They posted on social media that they were working to fix the issues caused by this outage. They apologized and hope to have everything back to normal soon.
Many users across the country reported these problems to Downdetector. More than one million people were affected by power outages after the storm. However, some users feel suspicious because the outages started just after the U.S. joint venture began.
The outage also coincides with protests in Minneapolis, where many ICE agents were sent to manage immigration operations. During this time, a border patrol agent shot and killed a man named Alex Pretti, raising serious concerns in the community.
Some TikTok users reported trouble finding information about these events. They worried about possible government censorship but TikTok insists the issues are due to the data center outage.
There were also worries about TikTok’s updated privacy policy. This policy allows TikTok to collect data about users, but some of these points are not new. They were in the policy before the new ownership began. This is mainly to follow California’s privacy laws.
While the TikTok glitches might just be bad timing, people are still concerned about privacy on social media, especially during times of unrest.