Sen. Tim Knopp on Legislating TikTok

If passed, House Bill 3127 would compel state employees to delete apps associated with six foreign companies — five Chinese and one Russian. The list includes payment processors, telecommunication companies, cybersecurity firms, media conglomerates and — perhaps most notably — ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok. Lawmakers have struggled to find common ground when legislating big tech, but are more cooperative when that big tech comes from competitor-states like China or Russia. Congresspeople grilled TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew during a 5-hour hearing on potential national security risks the apps could pose. With all the heat on TikTok, we reached out to HB3127 sponsor Sen. Tim Knopp (R-Bend) to learn more about the bill.

Sen. Tim Knopp is sponsoring a bill that would prohibit state employees from having apps that are tied to six companies that partner with either China or Russia. Credit: Tim Knopp

Source Weekly: I’ll start by asking how the list of six “covered vendors” come about?

Sen. Tim Knopp: Yeah, I mean, the group of the people covered in the bill, I think have been mentioned on a national and international level of companies of concern. And the company that essentially owns TikTok, ByteDance Limited, who has a separate company in China that essentially has a TikTok-like app. But I understand that that is mostly educational to the people of China. So, I thought that was interesting, but really, just from what we have seen and heard on a national and international level of apps that would be concerning for governments who have either been spying on us, U.S. citizens or U.S. companies.

SW: The coverage has focused a lot on TikTok. Is it because of the specific dangers of that app? Or is that just the most prominent one?

TK: I think the answer to your question is both, because TikTok is used by millions of Americans, especially kids, but adults as well. And obviously, we have a concern about the security of the network that the state has. And I believe that TikTok admitted recently that they go down to the granular level of tracking keystrokes of people who have the app. And I think they also admitted that they repeatedly accessed data from China. They also admitted to spying on three journalists that were employed by national news organization, I believe it was Forbes. And so, I think because of the popularity and because of what is known about what they do, I think that’s probably why they get the most attention.

SW: What sensative information could leak, and what would be the consequences of that that this bill would seek to prevent?

TK: Really, it’s about network security. So, it could be any number of things from just allowing state communications to be tracked or information to be procured or stolen by somebody who has ill intent. And there’s no real reason that anybody has come up with yet that would lead us to believe that it would be necessary for these apps to be on most of the state devices that are out there.

SW: Will this includes subsidiaries and partial owners? I know Tencent in particular is invested in some really popular companies like Epic Games, Ubisoft and discord.

TK: I think most of these companies have some foreign ownership or significant foreign ownership and so it applies to those that are listed here. Beyond that, I don’t know that there’s any particular prohibition.

SW: U.S. companies also collect data. Would you support any changes to how those companies are regulated as well?

TK: We’ve done various things over the years to make sure that data that’s collected by U.S. companies is done legally and isn’t being used for those specific purposes. But once the data is in the hands of a foreign company, which essentially is the Chinese government as it relates to some of these companies, I believe there’s other foreign ownerships of some of these other companies, it would be impossible for the state of Oregon to have any impact on those foreign governments. So, I mean, that’s why I think the concern about these particular companies as opposed to U.S. companies.

SW: There’s been some hearings in Washington these last couple of weeks, and I’ve seen some bipartisan support for a total ban on TikTok. Is that something you’d support?

TK: I think the first thing we need to do is to make sure that TikTok is not on government devices, including those in the state of Oregon, because that’s what we obviously have policymaking authority to do. I think looking at it broader, people deserve to have choices, but I think they need to understand the choices they’re making. I think the hearings are important at the federal level, and they may bring out or help us conclude that that may be necessary. But, I’m willing to say that the jury is out, at least at this point.

I haven’t been able to delve into the federal hearings, I’ve only been able to watch and engage at the state level at this point. So I think I’ll leave that to the federal regulators at this point, but I definitely wouldn’t say absolutely not. But I want to make sure that there’s a good sound policy reason why someone shouldn’t be able to access a, you know, the app of their choice. But again, I think they need to know exactly what they’re getting into, as it relates to that and what they could potentially be used for.

This article appears in Source Weekly March 30, 2023.