TikTok will soon join the list of social networks integrated into your favorite apps. On Monday, November 4, TikTok announced TikTok for Developers, a software development kit (SDK) that allows third-party apps to add a TikTok shortcut for easy sharing to the popular network focused on short videos.
The platform launches with seven apps already building a TikTok shortcut into the program, including mobile video editors like Adobe Premiere Rush, as well as Plotaverse, an app for turning still photos into GIF animations. The capability allows users to easily access more editing tools and options than what’s on TikTok alone.
Along with Rush and Plotaverse, the list of apps building in a TikTok integration includes PicsArt, a popular photo- and video-editing app; Enlight Videoleap, a mobile video editor; fuse.it, an augmented reality video tool; medal.tv, an app for sharing gaming videos; and Momento GIF Maker, an app for automatically generating animations from your camera roll.
“TikTok offers lots of creative filters and editing tools, and we want to continue giving our users the tools to create whatever they can imagine,” the company shared in a blog post. “We’re excited to extend our creative offerings with our new developer program.”
The share feature is the first tool launching in TikTok’s new SDK, allowing users to share directly from third-party apps. TikTok, owned by China-based Bytedance, says that the integration also means enriched content on the app.
The news comes shortly after the U.S. government launched a formal investigation into TikTok over the parent company’s acquisition of musical.ly because the company did not get approval from the Committee on Foreign Investment (CFIUS) prior to the acquisition.
Investment laws aren’t the platform’s only problem, however. Just a few days before the CFIUS investigation was announced, two senators called for an investigation into the app as a “counterintelligence threat,” over concerns that the app could collect user data, then be required to comply with Chinese law that may require the company to “cooperate with intelligence work.”
TikTok’s problems aren’t unique to the U.S. either — an investigation was opened this summer in the U.K. over how the app handles personal information for its youngest users.
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