While Tech Giants Pause Hiring and Cut Staff, TikTok Plans to Expand

The past few months have been fairly brutal for those working in tech — marked by job cuts and hiring freezes — from Meta announcing nearly 11,000 layoffs in early November to Twitter's massive job cuts under its new owner Elon Musk. Although it seems like even the biggest tech companies, such as Amazon, are pausing hiring or slashing jobs, TikTok stands out as an anomaly.

The short-form video app that has gained massive popularity over the past two years will hire about 1,000 employees at its Mountain View, California office, a source close to the situation told CNN. The hiring frenzy comes amid recent criticism and government concern over TikTok's parent company ByteDance's ties to China. The hiring initiative would ensure that U.S.-based employees monitor user data rather than an overseas team.

Related: The FBI is 'Extremely Concerned' About TikTok, Director Christopher Wray Tells Congress

"For many tech companies including ourselves one of the largest teams that you will have is your trust and safety team," TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew said at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum in Singapore. "That is an investment that is definitely worthwhile if you want to keep the platform a very safe platform."

Meanwhile, as other tech companies continue to trim staff, in-house recruiters at TikTok have begun approaching Silicon Valley engineers who have been laid off by neighboring tech giants, The Information reported.

According to the company site, TikTok currently has more than 4,000 open positions, more than half of which are based in the U.S.