After America, the Government of Britain and New Zealand has also banned Tiktok, Know why

The United Kingdom and New Zealand have now become the latest Western countries to ban Chinese-owned video-sharing platform TikTok on 'government equipment' after the United States. The New York Times gave this information.

The United Kingdom on Thursday announced a ban on TikTok with immediate effect, citing security fears linked to the ownership of the video-sharing app by a Chinese company.

Speaking in Parliament, Oliver Dowden, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, described the ban as 'precautionary'. The United States, the executive branch of the European Union, Canada and India had already taken similar steps.

According to The New York Times, Dowden said that social media apps collect and store vast amounts of user data, including contacts, user content and geolocation data, on government equipment, which can be sensitive. After the Corona epidemic, TikTok has attracted the most suspicion because of its owner, the Chinese company ByteDance. 

Britain's actions reflect fears expressed in a variety of Western governments that TikTok could be sharing sensitive data from devices used by politicians and senior officials with the government in Beijing. 

The ban was announced on Thursday after Britain announced a toughening of the policy. On Monday, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak described China as an 'epic challenge' to the international order.

As The New York Times reports, the new directive applies only to official work phones of government officials and is described by Dowden as a proportionate approach to addressing the potential vulnerability of government data.

In a statement on Thursday, TikTok said it was disappointing by the British government's decision. It says the sanctions imposed on it are "based on fundamental misunderstandings and motivated by broader geopolitics". He was taking steps to protect the data of British users. 

Recently a day ago, Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology Michelle Donnellan said that the app is safe for British people to use. "In terms of the general public, it is entirely a personal choice, but because we have some of the strongest data protection laws in the world, we are confident that the public can continue to use it," he added.

Earlier, the US had threatened to ban TikTok from the country unless the app's Chinese owner agreed to divest its share of the social media platform. TikTok chief executive Shou Zi Chew said the US is demanding that the company be separated from its Chinese owners.