LOGGING OUT

TikTok Abruptly Quits Hong Kong Following Beijing’s Power Grab

The company previously said it wouldn’t comply with any Chinese government requests to give access to its users’ data.

TikTok will quit the Hong Kong market this week following China’s move to impose a sweeping new national-security law on the semi-autonomous city, Reuters reports. “In light of recent events, we’ve decided to stop operations of the TikTok app in Hong Kong,” a TikTok spokesman told the news agency late Monday. An unnamed source added that the decision was taken because it’s now unclear whether Hong Kong will now fall entirely under Beijing’s rule. The short-form video app was launched by China-based ByteDance for users outside mainland China—its equivalent on the mainland is called Douyin. TikTok, which is now run by former Walt Disney executive Kevin Mayer, has said in the past that the app’s user data isn’t stored in China, and the company has also said it wouldn’t comply with any Chinese government requests to censor content or give access to its users’ data. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said that the U.S. is “certainly looking at” banning Chinese social-media apps, including TikTok.