Addictive Cash Rewards Appeal... Despite Security Concerns, 'TikTok' Thrives Domestically

Monthly Active Users of TikTok and TikTok Lite Reach Nearly 10 Million
4.89 Million and 4.79 Million Users Respectively
User Base Grows Rapidly in Korea With 'Cash Reward' Offers
Surge Among Young Generation Despite Security Concerns Over Chinese Apps

TikTok app on a smartphone. Photo by AFP Yonhap News

Amid revelations that domestic user data from DeepSeek, which faced controversy over excessive personal information collection, has been transferred to ByteDance (TikTok's parent company), TikTok and TikTok Lite are rapidly growing in the domestic market despite various controversies. In particular, TikTok Lite appears to have aggressively increased its user base in Korea by offering unprecedented rewards, such as paying out tens of thousands of won at once in points that can be cashed out through friend invitations and other methods.

According to IGAWorks Mobile Index on the 19th, the monthly active users (MAU) of TikTok and TikTok Lite last month were 4,898,510 and 4,791,235 respectively. Combined, this figure far surpasses Facebook's MAU of 8,618,065. Considering its rapid spread especially among younger generations, its influence is even greater.

Since officially launching TikTok Lite in the Korean market in December 2023 with a groundbreaking 'cash reward' system that gained global popularity, TikTok has quickly penetrated the market. Despite ongoing warnings since last year about concerns over user data leakage to the Chinese government and the addictive risks of TikTok Lite, it has maintained a steady growth trend.

Especially since the second half of last year, TikTok Lite's MAU has consistently exceeded 4 million, and combined with TikTok, it has long surpassed Facebook, showing an upward trend. Even this month, during the first week (3rd to 9th), the weekly active users were 3,268,409 for TikTok and 3,585,001 for TikTok Lite, maintaining a stable trend above 3 million.

Reference photo to aid understanding of the article. Pixabay

Earlier on the 17th, the Personal Information Protection Commission announced, "It has been confirmed that DeepSeek user information was transferred to ByteDance," and decided to temporarily suspend new downloads of the service due to violations of domestic personal information protection laws. A commission official explained the reason for the block, stating, "Under domestic personal information protection laws, consent must be obtained from the information provider when transferring information to a third party, and it must specify what information is collected, why, and how long it will be retained. However, DeepSeek's privacy policy and terms of use do not reflect these requirements." Recently, the security industry pointed out that DeepSeek's AI model contains code that directly sends user data to China Mobile, a Chinese state-owned telecommunications company, but the commission said, "It has not yet been confirmed that data was transferred to China Mobile."

Concerns about user information security issues involving Chinese IT companies like ByteDance have been ongoing, especially in the West. In particular, countries like the United States approach this issue from a national security perspective, fearing that the collected information could eventually flow to the Chinese government. Last year in the U.S., a bill was passed that would ban TikTok's service if ByteDance did not sell TikTok's U.S. operations within 270 days due to concerns that user data collected by TikTok could be transferred to the Chinese government. It is observed that former President Donald Trump, who took office on the 20th of last month, delayed the enforcement of the TikTok ban law for 75 days, emphasizing the sale of the business.