TikTok is arguing its case before Congress and making big changes that it hopes will head off a US ban.
Are you on TikTok? Let me rephrase that. Are you on TikTok this minute? If TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew’s numbers are accurate, half of the US is using the platform every month. Even if you aren’t on right now, it’s a good bet you will be at some point today. That habit, however, is in danger as the US Government seriously considers an outright ban on what is arguably the most popular social media platform in the world.
In a rare show of unity, both the Biden Administration and a normally sharply-divided US Congress agree that TikTok should either be banned or its Chinese parent company should be forced to sell it.
The concern is ByteDance’s connections to the Chinese government, which can easily examine the technologies and data of any company operating within its borders.
As relations between China and the US grow colder, companies that have manufactured in China for decades, including Apple and Amazon, are slowly shifting their operations back to the US and other countries like India. But that process is slow and, for instance, the majority of the best iPhones are still produced by Apple partner Foxconn (opens in new tab), which is based in Zhengzhou, China.A lot of TikTok trouble
Concerns over TikTok’s Chinese parentage and risks to American privacy and data date back to the Trump Administration, which was the first to take a hard stance on the increasingly popular platform.
