The US Supreme Court has upheld a bipartisan law that could lead to a ban on TikTok, a decision with far-reaching implications for the Chinese-owned social media giant.
The law, known as the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, cites “national security” concerns over Beijing’s potential access to American user data through TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance.
The ruling comes amidst political uncertainty, as outgoing President Joe Biden, who supported the legislation, has deferred its enforcement to his successor.
TikTok, with 170 million US users, has pushed back against the law, claiming it violates free speech rights and insisting that its operations cannot be separated from ByteDance due to shared technology and intellectual property.
President-elect Donald Trump, once a staunch advocate for banning TikTok, has recently softened his stance, even engaging in discussions with TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Trump has requested a delay in implementing the law until his administration begins on Monday, leaving TikTok’s future uncertain.
While ByteDance has threatened to shut down the platform in the US if the law is enforced, the Supreme Court expressed skepticism over its arguments for free speech protections.
Image credit: Jonathan Kemper
I agree, exposing criminal activity including fraud, money laundering, false claims like they have weapons of mass destruction and child rape from our respective governments can be problematic for our politicians. But that is no reason to end that form of communication in this free world.
I would argue arresting and placing these politicians in front of a jury to decide their fate would lead to a better and more financially secure future for everyone.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WxdaU9AsnU
To be fair if Tik Tok was banned from the US a new US service would spring up almost immediately from another startup or an existing company such as Meta or even X.
Spite and envy are eating up the USA.
It wont see people rushing off to US platforms, that can be used to spy on end users. People are already migrating to Rednote in the USA……this is a futile process that wont change a thing, save perhaps the US public’s view of its govt and institutions……
Tik Tok is used by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as one of its many forms of ‘SOFT POWER’
TikTok, with 400 million active users daily, is recognized as spyware and a CCP tool. For example, the CCP has started a major propaganda campaign to cover up the fact that COVID-19 virus started in Wuhan in late 2019. It disseminated a large number of short videos by official media on TikTok, either falsely claiming that “U.S. soldiers brought the virus to Wuhan” or producing seemingly “objective and rigorous” analysis to feed the public exaggerated and false misinformation.
The Washington Post, in its article “TikTok’s Beijing roots fuel censorship suspicion as it builds a huge U.S. audience” on September 15, 2020, stated that TikTok “could prove to be one of China’s most effective weapons in the global information war, bringing Chinese-style censorship to mainstream U.S. audiences and shaping how they understand real-world events.”…… China plays the long game and buys and pays off certain western media to achieve its goal of domination, politically, religiously and otherwise. Here is a good example :
https://faluninfo.net/internal-ccp-source-during-video-conference-minister-of-public-security-outlines-plans-to-intensify-campaign-against-falun-gong-shen-yun-in-the-united-states/