As many of you may have heard, the US Government issued restrictions on use of TikTok in June 2023. These prohibitions will be implemented at Penn State as a condition of accepting new Federal contracts. Please note that these prohibitions will not affect everyone at Penn State, but they will impact staff and administrators who access proposals and other technical documents:
Requirement:
If Penn State staff access proposal documents, technical reports, or other Technical Data in the performance of their Penn State duties, then they are prohibited from using a device on which TikTok is installed to perform those duties. They also are prohibited from accessing TikTok via a web browser on any devices they use to conduct said duties. This includes phones and other personal devices. Additional guidance can be found here: https://www.research.psu.edu/node/6417.
Penn State has implemented the ban technologically on all of the Office of Sponsored Programs Penn State owned workstations. Now we ask that the Local IT staff for the College and Campus Research Offices implement the ban on the workstations for anyone who accesses proposal documents, technical reports, or other Technical Data as part of their Penn State duties. The IT staff can follow the guidance in the link above.
If you use a personal phone to access proposal documents, technical reports, or other Technical Data you must delete the TikTok app from your phone. If you have any questions on how to remove the app from your device, please contact the Penn State IT Service Desk at ITservicedesk@psu.edu.