Will TikTok's time be cut short?
With over 150 million American users on the app, it’s safe to say that TikTok has made its mark on the United States, but how long will it last?
TikTok, a creation of the Chinese company ByteDance, was originally launched in 2017 under the name Douyin. Later that year, ByteDance bought Music.ly and eventually merged the two apps to create TikTok.
In 2020, former President Donald Trump attempted to ban the app. Trump’s team believed that the app was a threat to national security because user data could be easily accessed by the Chinese authoritarian regime. Based on this suspicion, they wished to prevent the app from being downloaded and used in the U.S. His actions were eventually blocked by federal courts.
This was not the first time the app was suspected of being a risk to national security and it would not be the last.
Over the years, there have been many concerns about the security of user data stored by the app. Western governments have grown concerned with the perceived ease of accessibility that the Chinese government has when it comes to Chinese companies. Lawmakers in support of the ban point to laws that allow the Chinese government to demand data from Chinese-owned companies to support this claim.
As of 2023, President Joe Biden’s administration is considering a TikTok ban if Chinese owners do not release their stakes in the company.
A bill has been proposed which would give the secretary of Commerce the power to enforce such a ban. The bill has bipartisan support and in response to this potential ban, TikTok has enacted “Project Texas.”
“Project Texas” is a $1.5 billion dollar project that creates a United States committee that will help establish app and user security and relocate all U.S. user data to U.S. servers. This ensures the data of U.S. citizens will never pass through Chinese servers.
The United States, along with Britain and its Parliament, Canada, the European Parliament, European Commission, the EU Council and New Zealand’s Parliament, have banned the app from all official devices. On April 4, that list grew when Australia announced that the app would be prohibited from all government devices.
In 2020, India banned the app on the basis that user data was transmitted to servers outside of India.
Shou Chew, TikTok’s chief executive, appeared and testified before the House of Energy and Commerce Committee on Mar. 23.
The latest developments in the TikTok saga include a Vietnam probe into possible “toxic” content on the platform and the banning of TikTok use at all Florida universities.
Vietnam’s probe will investigate the content that “poses a threat to the country’s youth, culture and tradition,” according to the Information Ministry and USA Today reported that Florida universities have banned the use of TikTok while on campus Wi-Fi or while using school-owned devices.
