(Bloomberg) Hackers have targeted well-known brands and celebrities on TikTok, sending malicious links through private messages and taking over their famous accounts.
Most read articles on Bloomberg
The ByteDance-owned social media service said it was mitigating the impact of the incident and working to prevent it from happening again. The company confirmed that intruders had compromised cable news channel CNN's account, but a spokesman declined to provide a full list of accounts that were targeted or compromised.
The scale of the hack was not immediately clear, but the spokesperson added that “the number of compromised accounts is very small.”
“Our security team is aware of a potential attack targeting a number of brand and celebrity accounts,” a spokesperson said in a statement. “We stopped this attack and have taken steps to prevent this from happening in the future. Where necessary, we will work directly with affected account holders to restore access.”
TikTok's future in the United States has become a hot topic ahead of the US presidential election in November. China-based ByteDance is currently facing a deadline to sell TikTok amid concerns that the Beijing government could influence TikTok's algorithm or collect sensitive information about US users. ByteDance is suing the US government in an attempt to block the forced sale.
More than 170 million Americans use the service every month.
Most read articles on Bloomberg Businessweek
©2024 Bloomberg LP
