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“ByteDance is not owned or controlled by the Chinese government. It is a private company,” TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew said during the March 23 hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
Right, ByteDance, TikTok’s Chinese parent company, is a private company, but refusing control from the Chinese government might not be a safe option for the company’s China-based executives, given the government’s track record of punishing the country’s business executives for not toeing the party line.
While the U.S. government publicly mulls over what to do with TikTok, including a possible ban, the Chinese government continues to quietly strengthen control over the country’s tech industry and its kingpins. The latest casualty is Bao Fan, a billionaire and star tech investor.
In mid-February, Bao vanished. Days later, his firm released a terse statement saying he was cooperating with an unspecified investigation. People close to Bao were dismayed by the detention. Just a month before, the billionaire was in a buoyant mood, telling his employees to “go forward boldly” during his firm’s annual party.
It’s not uncommon for Chinese authorities to forcibly “disappear” business executives, a practice that has increased in recent years under President Xi Jinping. Some executives have never been heard from again. Some have returned to work as if nothing had happened. Some ended up going to prison. Some even mysteriously died when incarcerated.
Here are some well-known cases: In 2015, Xu Ming, real estate tycoon and once the eighth richest man in China, died of “a heart attack,” according to authorities, in a Shanghai prison at the age of 44, months before he was due to be released.
