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Rapidly-growing mobile video company TikTok has appointed Erich Andersen, a former Microsoft lawyer, as its Global General Counsel.

Andersen was previously Microsoft’s Chief Intellectual Property Counsel, and held various other roles at the company during his 20 year career there.

Andersen will report to TikTok President Alex Zhu.

"Today's announcement marks TikTok's latest move in building out our global expertise in key areas such as compliance and IP protection. Erich is uniquely qualified to lead those efforts, building upon the strengths of our current legal team. His deep experience is an excellent asset as we work to further build trust with regulators, policymakers, users and partners." Mr. Zhu said.

TikTok is owned by Chinese tech company ByteDance. After surging user growth last year, the company is making a push to attract US advertisers.

According to data frim research firm Sensor Tower, TikTok and its Chinese version Douyin have been downloaded more than 1.5 billion times, making it one of the most popular apps in the world. Last year it was downloaded more times than Facebook and Instagram were.

Yesterday Bloomberg reported that ByteDance was .