More US states are banning the popular social media service TikTok on government-managed devices. Louisiana and West Virginia are the latest to ban TikTok over concerns of China using it to track Americans and censor content.
Out of 50 US states, 19 states have now partially blocked TikTok's access to government computers. TikTok is owned by Beijing-based ByteDance Ltd.
The restrictions were imposed to the social media app within the past two weeks, said reports.
Some members of Congress last week even proposed a nationwide ban, reported Reuters.
Jamf Holding Corp, which sells software to organisations to enable filtering and security measures on iPhones and other Apple devices, said its government customers have increasingly blocked access to TikTok since the middle of this year, reported Reuters.
About 65 per cent of attempted connections to TikTok have been blocked this month on devices managed by Jamf's public sector customers worldwide, including school districts and various other agencies, up from 10 per cent of connections being blocked in June, reported Reuters.
"Disappointed that so many states are jumping on the political bandwagon to enact policies based on unfounded falsehoods about TikTok that will do nothing to advance the national security of the United States," TikTok said in a statement.
Meanwhile, Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin said that he banned TikTok on all devices his agency owns, citing potential security threats.
US officials and TikTok have been in talks for months about a national security pact that would address the concerns about China's access to data on TikTok.
Countries like India and Russia had banned and restricted the use of TikTok.
