Chinese-owned social media site TikTok has instructed US senators that it was operating on the final settlement with the Biden Administration that would 'fully safeguard user data and US national security interests,' as per a letter.

HIGHLIGHTS
As per TikTok, China-based employees can have access to user data.
TikTok is working with Oracle on advanced data security controls.
TikTok is considered one of the most popular social media apps in the world.

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TikTok Chief Executive Shou Zi Chew has told senators in a letter dated on Thursday that the short video app has been working with Oracle on 'new advanced data security controls in the hope to finalize it soon.'

Last month, TikTok claimed that it had completed migrating the information on its US users to servers at Oracle however, the US and Singapore data are still used for backup.

TikTok's letter mentioned that China-based employees can have direct access to TikTok US user data, although it is subject to a series of robust cybersecurity controls and authorization approval protocols got overseen by our US-based security team.'

TikTok added that it would continue to work on data issues as it expects them to delete US users' protected data from their systems and fully pivot it to an Oracle cloud server that is located in the US.

One of the TikTok spokespeople has confirmed that the company has sent a response to the senators' letter. 'We look forward to connecting with the members of Congress to discuss the substance of our letter,' the spokesperson has mentioned in a statement to Reuters.

Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn said TikTok 'should always come clean initially but instead tried to shroud their work in secrecy. The Americans need to know that if they are on TikTok, then Communist China has all their information. Therefore, TikTok needs to come back and testify before Congress.'

The letter comes about two years after a US national security panel ordered parent company ByteDance to divest TikTok out of fears that US user data would be handed over directly to China's communist government.

The letter stated, 'We are already aware that we are among the most scrutinized platforms that also from a security standpoint and we always aim to remove any kind of doubt about the security of US user data.'

TikTok is considered one of the world's most popular social media apps with more than 1 billion active users worldwide, and the United States always counted as its largest market.

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