Chinese video app TikTok has reportedly fired its entire Indian workforce. According to a report by the Economic Times, the ByteDance-owned application has given pink slips to 40 people this week after a call. The daily mentioned that a severance pay of nine months would be given to the employees.
Citing a source, ET said that TikTok employees in India were told that 28 February would be their last day in the company. And, were given feelers to look out for other opportunities for some time as it was conveyed that restarting operation in India was not going to take off because of government’s stance on Chinese apps”.
The Indian employees were mostly working in Brazil and Dubai after the Indian government banned the TikTok application, along with 300 other Chinese apps in June 2020 citing national security concerns.
TikTok had more than 200 million users in India before it got banned in 2020.
Meanwhile, the Chinese app is likely to face a ban even in United States. TikTok is already been banned on federal devices and some college campuses over privacy concerns.
Talks on the TikTok ban in America date back to Donald Trump’s presidency when he raised alarms that the app could pose a national security threat.
TikTok critics in America have pointed out that China may use the platform to access the data of its citizens.
The criticism intensified during winter after reports revealed ByteDance repeatedly accessed US user data and planned to use TikTok to track the location of specific US citizens.
US President Joe Biden approved a ban on TikTok on devices owned by government agencies in December.
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