TikTok is one of the most famous social media around, and it gets that title for obvious reasons.
From the way it provides content in the most entertaining ways, to the many variety of content is has, packed in such engaging format, makes the social media a destination to many youngsters around the world. It's so likeable that the U.S. is worried.
And that worrisome becomes more apparent, when TikTok is found asking for some users' iPhone passcodes before allowing them to continue to use the app.
And indeed some users are unsettled.
Given its prior allegations by Western media, the accusation of stealing personal data of users through its in-app keyboard, and allegations of spying on journalists, seeing TikTok asking for such sensitive information quickly heightened concerns.
Making things even more worrying, even TikTok itself doesn’t explicitly state the exact cause.
Some concerned iPhone users have shared their finding on Reddit.
At first, it's suggested that the passcode request on TikTok is a "temporary security measure" addressing vulnerabilities or privacy issues.
Then, others said that it could be linked to an app update, glitch, or a bug.
Some others said that it was to enable the “restricted mode.”
On TikTok, the "restricted mode”" might prompt a password to serve as a content censor.
It's then revealed that TikTok stopped sending constant requests for passcodes once TikTok is updated to version 32.5.0 of the app for iOS.
Some others however, noted that the app did not stop requesting for their iPhone passcode even after installing the update.
Meanwhile, many other users got so frightened by the fact that they deliberately changed passwords on important apps including their banking and other financial apps.
Some other users even thought of deleting the TikTok app to be safe.
Some Reddit users also offered a temporary workaround to fix the TikTok issue, while some found that tapping on the cancel button instead of giving their passcode were also able to continue with their TikTok session.
It's worth noting that TikTok supports passkeys on iOS devices.
"Passkeys are password replacements that can confirm your identity based on encrypted biometric authentication methods already available on your device. When you use passkeys, all biometric authentication data remains on your device and cannot be accessed or processed by third party apps, like TikTok. If you are an iOS user, you may already use passkeys on other applications. For your TikTok account, you will now have the option to use passkeys instead of a password to sign into your TikTok account directly from your iCloud account across devices," explained TikTok in a post on its website.
Apps using passkeys, including TikTok, cannot access or process any of the biometric data used in the authentication process on iOS devices, and all biometric authentication data remains on users' devices.
But this case is different, because TikTok blatantly asked for users passcode, and this is the reason why the pop-up was so disconcerting for users.
It's worth noting that the issue happened back in November, but only made it to the media on December.
This happened after Apple issued two critical security updates for iPhone and other products, released on December 11th, which addressed a vulnerability that permitted unauthorized access to sensitive user data.
Experts have always cautioned users against sharing passwords, particularly in these circumstances, citing significant security risks and vulnerability to phishing attempts.