‘Goodbye to my Chinese spy’ might be the last great TikTok trend

TikTokers are coping with the app’s potential ban with an unusual trend: by bidding farewell to their “personal Chinese spy.” The trend, which pokes fun at security concerns surrounding the app, has users thanking their “spy” for surveilling them and filling their For You page with entertaining content, while others proclaim that they’d rather share their data directly with the Chinese government than switch to Instagram Reels or YouTube Shorts.

One post, which garnered more than 1.5 million likes, depicts an emotional scene from Squid Game with the caption, “Me saying goodbye to my Chinese spy on the 19th (He perfected my algorithm).” Other TikTokers are speaking — and singing — in Chinese, while some pretend to be the “spies” powering individual algorithms.

“It is a great honor to spy on you for the last few years,” TikToker yanxiao1003 says in a video. “I wish you all have a great life in the future… Laura from California, you shouldn’t drink that much Coca-Cola, it’s bad for your health.”