That’s right, the University of Houston has announced that they will be banning the hit social media platform from their campus network starting in 2025.
No TikTok in Houston
I should start with saying that it is unclear if the TikTok app will be available on all personal devices. What IS known is that, according to a security memo from University of Houston System, they will be begin blocking the popular site on January 3, 2025.
Starting this date, TikTok will be “unavailable on the UH network.” This includes the immediate removal of the platform on UH owned computers and mobile devices.
UH urges all students, faculty, and staff who are currently using university-issued devices to remove the app immediately. Additional controls will be applied where these apps can no longer be installed once removed.
Texas Gov. Abbott’s TikTok Ban
The decision comes from Gov. Abbott’s efforts in 2022 to limit China’s potential influence on American citizens.
In a letter to State Agency Heads in December 2022, Abbott revealed the threat of having a widely accessed social platform partially owned by the Chinese Communist Party.
The governor also included that TikTok harvests large amount of personal data from its users. This information could be accessed and sent to the Chinese government, posing a severe threat to American security.
The ban issued on TikTok only applied to government and/or state-issued devices like cell phones, laptops, tablets, and desktop computers.
The University of Houston is just the latest in public universities applying a ban to the China-based social media platform, as others like UT in Austin have been prohibiting TikTok since February 2023, according to Chron.
