As far as I know, there are no laws against eating broken glass. You’re free to doomscroll through your cabinets, smash your favorite water cup, then scarf down the shards.

A ban on eating broken glass would be overwhelmingly irrelevant, since most people just don’t do it, and for good reason. Unfortunately, you can’t say the same about another dangerous habit: TikTok.

As a security researcher, I can’t help but hate TikTok, just like I hate all social media, for creating unnecessary personal exposure.

As a security researcher working in journalism, one group of the video-sharing app’s many, many users give me heartburn. These users strike a particular fear into my heart. This group of users is — you guessed it — my beloved colleagues, the journalists.

TikTok, of course, isn’t the only app that poses risks for journalists, but it’s been bizarre to watch reporters with sources to protect express concern about a TikTok ban when they shouldn’t be using the platform in the first place. TikTok officials, after all, have explicitly targeted reporters in attempts to reveal their sources.

My colleagues seem to nonetheless be dressing up as bullseyes.

Ignoring TikTok’s Record

Impassioned pleas by reporters........

© The Intercept