Major Tiktok Security Flaw Uncovered

TikTok, the popular short-format video app, with over a billion users, suffers from serious security flaws and is vulnerable to hackers, according to Check Point Research, a cybersecurity company. The popular video app company has fixed the security issues after it was warned about the lapses in its services.

Check Point research revealed details of the security vulnerabilities in a blog post. The cyber intelligence company had informed TikTok about the problems in its app in early November. TikTok took note and fixed the bugs by December 15. Check Point Research chose to make the blog post public at a later date to give time to TikTok to fix the issues and let the public know about it and be warned.

The report stated that attackers could send TikTok users malicious links as messages, which subsequently allowed them to take control of the account, once the message was opened. Hackers could upload and manipulate the videos and make private videos public of the users.

The bugs in the site also made private information of the users on the TikTok website open to attacks.

Checkpoint has also filed a report to the Department of Homeland Security to take cognizance. The United States already is concerned about the security issues in TikTok and is carrying on investigations.

Major Tiktok Security Flaw

TikTok’s head of security, Luke Deshotels, told the New York Times that there was “no indication” that anyone had exploited the security flaws in the app.

There are growing concerns in the U.S. of the huge popularity of the video app, which till date has been downloaded by 1.5 billion users worldwide. (Image Credit: Shutterstock)

Earlier in 2019, a class-action lawsuit seeking a ban was brought against TikTok by a California college student for illegally transferring user data to servers in China.

Tik Tok and its Beijing-based parent company, ByteDance, were accused of transferring private data to unknown servers in China and harvesting biometrics of users without consent.

The US government has TikTok in its sights as it says there are security concerns about the data collected by the tiktok company, including access to contacts, IP addresses, location mapping, and other sensitive personal information.

The United States defense has banned its cadet from using the app while in uniform. The government is also not happy about the censorships extended by the app regarding the HongKong protests against China.

Also, a committee on foreign investments has launched an investigation into the acquisition of Musical.ly by ByteDance, which was later renamed as TikTok. Musical.ly was a music app where one could post karaoke videos and was popular among its 60 million subscribers, mainly western teenagers.