Tiktok security risk

[ch33zw1z]

Forbes: Anonymous Hackers Target TikTok: ‘Delete This Chinese Spyware Now’.

Anonymous Hackers Target TikTok: ‘Delete This Chinese Spyware Now’

Even Anonymous is now warning about the dangers of China's blockbuster video-sharing app.

www.forbes.com

Looks like tiktok was caught accessing sensitive areas of devices.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

I am firmly against nearly all apps now.

I’ll load work related apps because I have to

 

[ch33zw1z]

I hate Tik Tok. I like Instagram more. Besides, your data has been leaked for a long time, so there's nothing to worry about.

Interesting, what other apps should I be worried about grabbing clipboard info

 

[CP5670]

I avoid using apps for anything that has a website. It's much easier to control data access and script usage on a website than an app.

 

[ch33zw1z]

While on the Internet, every user is vulnerable. You can't be 100% safe no matter your social network.

I dont Think anyone has really argued otherwise.

however, a user can take steps to reduce risk, such as not using apps that have been revealed as being riskier than others, like TikTok

 

[Red Squirrel]

I pretty much don't trust any apps or stock OS of any smart phone, they are built from ground up for spying on us. Smart phones are black boxes, too hard to really know what's even going on behind the scenes and they have lot of sensors like mic, camera, gyro etc that can all be used to spy on our environment, but they also have sensitive info such as our phone number and contacts.

I run a custom rom myself so can't install these apps even if I wanted to as I don't have a Play store. Unfortunately more and more things seem to require apps now which is making it harder to use a custom rom or not have a smart phone at all. I've ran into routers that require an app just to configure it! And these are ISP modem/router combos so you don't have a choice but to use it. If you want to travel outside of Canada you also need to install government software on your phone. Our local taxi company has also moved to an app only approach. I hate this trend so much. Just make this stuff a regular website instead so it's device agnostic.

 

[bononos]

I pretty much don't trust any apps or stock OS of any smart phone, they are built from ground up for spying on us. Smart phones are black boxes, too hard to really know what's even going on behind the scenes and they have lot of sensors like mic, camera, gyro etc that can all be used to spy on our environment, but they also have sensitive info such as our phone number and contacts.
.......

There are separate contact apps that don't sync with google or you can select individual contacts which you want to sync. I'm not sure but Samsung's secure folder might be a way to isolate dodgy apps.

 

[Captante]

Interesting, what other apps should I be worried about grabbing clipboard info

Fair question.... I would keep it in mind for ALL of them.

Best bet is any app you don't use at least once or twice a week should be uninstalled until needed again. (especially on mobile devices)

Further if you use Android be extremely careful granting "permissions" like "precise location" and be sure they're set to automatically "revoke" after a period of inactivity.

It pains me to say this but 95% of "free" apps have some ulterior-motive and it usually involves relieving folks of their information and/or money.

 

[Red Squirrel]

It's probably safe to assume they all do it. Coding an app is a lot of work compared to a web site and most of these apps could easily be a website. So to me the only incentive for putting in that work is that they are making tons of money selling user info as apps have more granular access to your private information and sensors such as mic, camera, GPS etc.

 

[ch33zw1z]

Grabbing clipboard data and sending it to a remote server isn’t quite the same as location data afaic.

I can manage location permissions relatively ez, there’s not an option to disable copying clipboard data