IRS not fully complying with TikTok ban

The Internal Revenue Service isn't in full compliance with the federal government's guidance for removal of TikTok from devices, according to a new report, but mainly because it hasn't been inserting the requirement in all its contracts and contract actions such as solicitations and modifications.

The report, released Friday by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, found that IRS contracting officers did not put the required Federal Acquisition Regulation clause from the Office of Management and Budget in all required contract actions. The FAR clause says contractors are prohibited from using TikTok or a subsidiary of TikTok's parent company during the performance of a contract. But IRS contracting officers were not inserting the FAR language in all the required solicitations and contracts. 

Congress passed the No TikTok on Government Devices Act in 2023 as part of a larger appropriations package, requiring agencies to remove the app from their devices. 

Gabby Jones/Bloomberg

The popular social media app is made by ByteDance, which is headquartered in Beijing and is considered to be a potential security vulnerability by the U.S. government. ByteDance has argued strenuously against a ban in the U.S. and insists that no user data is sent abroad.  

TIGTA's review of contract actions signed between June 2 and Aug. 16, 2023, found that contracting officers omitted the FAR clause in 68 of 163 contracts or solicitations, and 50 of 53 contract modifications. Contracting officers are required to include the FAR clause for prohibition on TikTok or TikTok's parent company in all solicitations and contracts unless an exception is granted in accordance with the OMB guidance. 

TIGTA made five recommendations in the report, saying the Office of the Chief Procurement Officer should ensure that IRS contracting officers are inserting the required FAR clause into all applicable contracts and solicitations. In addition, they should work with the contractor to modify the contract to include the required FAR clause in the seven contracts TIGTA identified and consider reviewing all contracts to determine whether they need to be modified to include the required clause. IRS management agreed with four of TIGTA's five recommendations. It disagreed with one recommendation but agreed to address it as part of two others.

In response to the report an IRS official noted that the guidance aid it was using to identify contracts that could potentially include TikTok or a subsidiary of its parent company included a list of possible North American Industry Classification codes, but the list wasn't meant to be all inclusive, so the contracting officers would need to assess each contract based on individual contract requirements. In some cases the clause was "inadvertently excluded in the contract actions due to the timing of guidance and/or when the contract actions were established."