The TikTok ban was never about national security or privacy. It's about the oligarchs not being able to control the algorithm of a very popular social media platform and hence, what users see.
I'm not saying there aren't national security or privacy issues with TikTok mind you, just saying what the real concern is. #privacy #security #social #oligarchy

The idea that China needs TikTok to gather data on US citizens is laughable. Our data is widely available for sale by multiple providers. But what value is it to the politburo?
Outside from the ever present risk of app use by the military and government (and other persons with sensitive jobs) which could primarily risk exposure of sensitive location data or possibly "overheard" audiovisual data. But that risk isn't limited to TikTok by any stretch. And it won't be solved by any ban. Even web sites can collect this sort of data. But security theatre always has such traction. Especially with Trumpty.

what do they do with our data? What does the real world use of it look like? I know this isn't an easy question to answer, but please can you.

⛔ Blocked at network level since the rumors about access to the system clipboard. This is malware.