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The title should probably be "Is TikTok safe?" to reduce clickbait.
The current title is the opposite of clickbait, it's literally the conclusion of the article.
“Is TikTok safe?” is the definition of clickbait.

With the headline as it is here, you could read the headline and know enough to possibly make a decision.

Coming from a VPN company, I’m surprised they don’t speak about how much of this tracking is mitigated by using TikTok through a VPN.

Sure, it doesn’t solve their keylogging in the browser, but I would assume apart from that you are relatively well protected by your phone’s permission system. I’m not as familiar with iOS but on Android, IMEI and GPS won’t be accessible unless you grant some permissions.

(comment deleted)
Not a TikTok fan myself but this article is flimsy fear mongering.

The outlined risks are no worse than any other social media app. From the perspective of a US citizen, there is arguably less consequence to being spied on by the CCP than the FBI. You could make a better argument based on national security, though.

Regarding the key logger [1]:

> Mr. Krause, 28, said he was unable to ascertain whether keystrokes were actively being tracked, and whether that data was being sent to TikTok.

[1] https://archive.is/srCg4#selection-669.0-669.143 (https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/19/technology/tiktok-browser...)

The article's conclusion could be applied to Facebook and Instagram.

>>there’s also little doubt that China genuinely is a threat, not just US-national security, but to the national security of many nations

For many nations and people the United States is more of a security issue than China.

The article explicitly stated the equivalency of the privacy threat from tiktok and US social media apps.