TikTok US Explains Privacy Policy Update
TikTok US Explains Privacy Policy Update
https://www.socialmediatoday.com/news/tiktok-us-explains-privacy-policy-update/811665/
Publish Date: 2026-02-08 14:22:00
Source Domain: www.socialmediatoday.com
It’s taken a little while, but the TikTok USDS JV team has come through with an explanation of its recent privacy policy changes, which have sparked a wave of conspiracy theories and concerns over the past couple of weeks.
As a quick recap, on January 22nd, TikTok’s parent company ByteDance announced that it had come to terms with a U.S. ownership consortium on a new deal that would split TikTok’s U.S. business into its own separate unit, in order to meet the requirements of U.S. law. That means that TikTok in America now operates under different management to the regular TikTok app, which sparked concern among many users as to how this new group, which has been hand-picked by the Trump Administration, may look to change things with the algorithm, data gathering, etc.
Those concerns were immediately piqued by an in-app notification sent out to users the day after the deal was enacted, informing them of a change to TikTok’s privacy policy under the new group.
What does this mean? What are they actually changing? Does this give them the right to gather more information on users?
As I noted at the time, the changes are actually pretty mundane, and/or in line with industry standards. And now, TikTok US has provided its own explanation of its updated terms.
As per TikTok: “Our U.S. Privacy Policy aligns with data privacy laws, mirroring language used in state laws like the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). These laws require companies to describe broad categories of personal information that could be processed, including when that information is shared voluntarily by you – for example, in the content you post to platforms.”
So, again, the updated privacy policy did include new notes about data gathering and the usage of your info for off-platform advertising. But as TikTok US notes, this is all fairly standard, and there’s nothing obviously untoward here.
“When you voluntarily post…
