FILE PHOTO: A person holds a smartphone with Tik Tok logo displayed in this picture illustration taken November 7, 2019. Picture taken November 7, 2019. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
July 7, 2020
By Echo Wang
(Reuters) – TikTok said it will exit the Hong Kong market within days, a spokesman told Reuters on late Monday, as other technology companies including Facebook Inc<FB.O> have suspended processing government requests for user data in the region.
The short form video app owned by China-based ByteDance has made the decision to exit the region following China’s establishment of a sweeping new national security law for the semi-autonomous city.
“In light of recent events, we’ve decided to stop operations of the TikTok app in Hong Kong,” a TikTok spokesman said in response to a Reuters question about its committment to the market.
The company, now run by former Walt Disney Co<DIS.N> executive Kevin Mayer, has said in the past that the app’s user data is not stored in China.
(Reporting by Echo Wang; Editing by Kenneth Li & Shri Navaratnam)
