John,

President Biden has said he would sign a bill that would ban TikTok.¹ The RESTRICT Act is by far the most serious attempt to ban TikTok for all Americans. If it passes, it would be an unprecedented act of censorship by the government.

Banning TikTok makes no sense when tons of other platforms collect, share, and sell just as much of our data. To prevent governments from surveilling us, we don’t need app bans—we need privacy laws that actually work. Tell lawmakers: Don’t ban TikTok! Pass a real data privacy law instead.

Take Action

Politicians caught up in TikTok fever have already succeeded in blocking the app from government devices in Congress, the White House, federal agencies, and over half of US states.² Let's be clear—we should all be concerned about how apps collect and abuse our data. But the Chinese government isn’t getting data from TikTok it couldn’t get tons of other ways, including simply buying YouTube or Facebook data from a data broker.

The bottom line is that banning TikTok won’t make us safe from data exploitation, and it will strip online communities and organizing tools from millions. There’s a reason the ACLU has come out hard against the latest attempts to strip the app from our phones.³

Lawmakers need to understand that we’ll never be safe until we’re protected from ALL data-hungry apps that collect, store, and sell our personal data. With enough outcry, they'll have to stop their ridiculous TikTok scapegoating. Add your name and tell lawmakers: Stop feeding panic over TikTok, and pass real privacy laws to protect all Americans.

Thanks,

Evan

1. NBC News: https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/restrict-act-bill-tiktok-rcna73682

2. Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/01/20/tiktok-bans-states-colleges/

3. Reuters: https://www.reuters.com/technology/aclu-urges-us-lawmakers-not-ban-tiktok-2023-02-28/