Want to watch TikTok dances? Access to the app could be banned from SC school devices
South Carolina kindergarten through 12th grade students and teachers wouldn’t be able to watch or record TikTok dances on public school-issued electronic laptops or tablets if a Senate proposal passes.
The Senate Finance Committee adopted a proviso, a one-year law attached the state’s budget, that would ban TikTok from devices owned or leased by a school district. The budget still needs to be approved by the full Senate, agreed to by the House and signed by the governor before becoming law.
TikTok, which is owned by Chinese company ByteDance, has been under fire because it tracks users’ likes, dislikes and personal information such as phone numbers, email addresses and WiFi networks.
There is fear the Chinese government could force the company to share the data that it collects.
“There’s all kinds of issues surrounding social media and the hazards of social media,” said state Sen. Sean Bennett, R-Dorchester. “But then you add to the questions of TikTok, the privacy of TikTok, the ownership of TikTok, all those things that are out there in the public now that we’re really just starting to peel the onion back on and see what’s there and what the challenges are. I think there are members of the body that would rather put the brakes on while we evaluate that.”
State Reps. Heather Bauer, D-Richland, and Bobby Cox, R-Greenville, have proposed banning the app from state-owned devices. That bill is still in the House Judiciary Committee.
Last year, Gov. Henry McMaster asked the Department of Administration to remove TikTok from all state-issued devices managed by the department, which immediately blocked TikTok on 65,000 devices on the state’s network that most state agencies use.
Schools may block social media apps while the devices are connected to the school network, but those blocks may not work when students or teachers log onto another network, including from their homes.
“Students are playing on that thing all the time,” said state Sen. Shane Martin, R-Spartanburg, who proposed the proviso. “I think government taking a role and looking at the fact that it’s coming from China, you can’t monitor it; it’s spying on people. I just think that we don’t need that on government-funded computers.”
