The Biden administration has been calling for the Chinese owners of popular video-sharing app TikTok to divest their stakes, citing national security concerns. The Treasury-led Committee on Foreign Investment in the US (CFIUS) has issued a demand to ByteDance executives to sell their stake or face potential ban in the US. Congress has been increasingly scrutinizing the app and discussing a potential ban, with Republicans criticizing the Biden Administration for not taking action. I
In response, TikTok has argued that divestment would not address the perceived security problems and that the best way to protect national security is through the transparent U.S.-based protection of US user data and systems with third-party monitoring, vetting and verification. The company is continuing with its “Project Texas” plan to route user traffic through Oracle Cloud servers in Texas. The Biden administration has endorsed a bipartisan bill, called the Restricting the Emergence of Security Threats that Risk Information and Communications Technology Act, that would grant the Commerce Department broad powers to ban or limit TikTok and other technology apps rooted in foreign countries.
Meanwhile, a new poll by Quinnipiac University found that support for a national ban of TikTok is divided along generational and partisan lines. It also showed that 49 percent of people in the poll supported the ban, while 42 percent did not. I
CEO Shou Zi Chew of TikTok is set to testify in front of the House Energy and Commerce Committee about the company’s ties to China and its privacy and security practices of consumer data. The company has spent more than $1.5 billion on data security initiatives and denies spying allegations. Any US ban would face substantial legal hurdles. I
The situation has been escalating as governments around the world have moved to ban or restrict TikTok and the company is exploring potential deals with potential buyers. It remains to be seen if the Biden administration will make a good on its threats of a US ban.