Today, many question the way in which TikTok seems to read our minds and provide content that we may have recently mentioned to friends and family both verbally and virtually. Do we have any privacy with this platform? I decided to do some investigating on this rapidly growing social media platform.
TikTok, aka the “Platform”, updated its Privacy Policy in the United States on January 1, 2020. The site is simply formatted and easy to read for the average viewer. The company states that when you register you have the choice to provide the following information:
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- Registration information: age, username and password, language, and email/phone number
- Profile information: name, social media account information, and profile image
- User-generated content: comments, photographs, videos, and virtual item videos that you choose to upload or broadcast
- Payment information
- Phone and social network contacts (with permission)
- Opt-in choices and communication preferences
- Information to verify an account
- Information in correspondence sent to the company
- Information shared through surveys or participation in challenges, sweepstakes, or contests (gender, age, likeness, preferences)
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Okay… The information we know we share with TikTok is listed first and foremost. I scroll further.
TikTok then lists the information they take from other sources:
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- Social Media – i.e., Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google (if you choose to link/sign up with these networks)
- Third-Party Services (advertising partners and analytics providers)
- Other Users of the Platform
- Other Sources
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Ahhhh “other sources” I seeee. “Other sources” under the “Information we obtain from other sources” headline. Very specific. This bullet proves that we still don’t entirely know how the platform retrieves our information to create our perfectly tailored algorithms. One can only imagine.
Next, the Platform clarifies the information they collect automatically:
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- Usage Information
- Device Information
- Location data
- Messages through the app
- Metadata
- Cookies (collect information, measure, and analyze the web pages we click on and how we use the app to ‘enhance’ our experience, improve the app, and provide targeted advertising)
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- Allow service providers and business partners to collect information about online activities through cookies (TikTok takes no responsibility for the privacy practices of those service providers and business partners)
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The last part about cookies is a bit unnerving. We, again, do not have a full grasp on how much information we’re giving not only TikTok, but also their service providers and business partners. Would that make us more careful when using the app?
The next headline goes more in-depth into how they use our information – nothing too surprising. Again, how they work to bring the most customized, functional, and developed platform to you. One line that stands out to me is that they use the information “to combine all the information [they] collect or receive about [us] for any of the foregoing purposes.” Vague once again.
TikTok restates how they share our information: to service providers and business partners, within their corporate group, in connection with a sale, merger, or other business transfer, for legal reasons, and with our consent.
Under Other Rights, TikTok writes that “If you are a California resident, once a calendar year, you may be entitled to obtain information about personal information that [they] shared, if any, with other businesses for their own direct marketing uses.” … Why just California? What about the other states?
Our choices regarding privacy include refusing/disabling Cookies, managing third-party advertising preferences, opting out of some types of targeted advertising, switching off GPS location, and updating certain personal information.
So although we may question our privacy with TikTok, it is not much different from how our information is being handled on other social media platforms. When a platform is so tailored to us, do we really want to eliminate the cookies and breaches of privacy that make it possible?
In Funk’s article, “Cambridge Analytica and the Secret Agenda of a Facebook Quiz.” she describes the OCEAN (Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism) score on Facebook that builds our psychological profiles. Cambridge Analytica can gather 3,000 to 5,000 data points to profile every one of us for microtargeted ads. Through analyzing Cambridge Analytica’s strategy, it becomes clearer how our For You pages on TikTok can be made For You. TikTok has access to your personal information (as listed above), usage on the app (likes/comments/hashtags/followers), as well as “other sources” and social media outlets – thus, giving it the thousands of data points to accurately profile you and perfectly curate your experience on the app.
I asked what my hallmate’s stance is on TikTok’s privacy – more specifically, the privacy of the For You page:
“And how do you feel about the For You page?”
“Um.. it’s kind of creepy. Like I swear it hears what I’m saying … I feel like a lot of times it’s definitely feeding to either what it wants me to see or what it thinks I want to see or hear. And that’s kind of, I don’t know, I’m probably not as careful about it as I should be but it’s, it kind of like, makes me realize, how easy it is for apps like that to have your information and know what you like and want to see.”
Ultimately, you decide the amount of information you want to give to platforms like TikTok . Your perceived privacy is up to you … but up to a certain point, depending on what you decide to let these platforms access. To reap some of the ‘benefits’, you have to grant permission to external sources that branch to others from there. As the Privacy Policy site states, “You should understand that no data storage system or transmission of data over the Internet or any other public network can be guaranteed to be 100 percent secure.” Practice safe social media usage. There is most definitely a lack of privacy in today’s world, so be aware and educate yourself on topics that are not microtargeted to you.
Funk, McKenzie. “Cambridge Analytica and the Secret Agenda of a Facebook Quiz.” The New York Times, 17 Mar. 2018. NYTimes.com, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/20/opinion/cambridge-analytica-facebook-quiz.html.
“Privacy Policy.” TikTok, 1 Jan. 2020, www.tiktok.com/legal/privacy-policy?lang=en.
