The American Congress is trying to ban TikTok from their country. If the USA bans it, what will happen in Canada?
The White House voted on Wednesday to pass a bill that could ban TikTok from the U.S. Both Republicans and Democrats sounded the alarm that the Chinese platform is a nationwide threat. The representatives of the House require TikTok’s owner ByteDance to sell them the social media or face a total ban in the US. 352 Congress members have voted in favor of the bill and only 65 voted against it. The video-based platform is facing its biggest existential threat in the US.
The platform’s huge rise since 2017 alarmed some lawmakers, who believe that the China-based company could collect sensitive data about its users and censor content that goes against the Chinese government. TikTok has repeatedly said it hasn’t and would never share US data with the Chinese government. Some didn’t believe them and their concerns were proved when news investigators showed that some Chinese employees at ByteDance had accessed non-public data about US TikTok users.
What if the bill gets signed? ByteDance would have 165 days to sell TikTok to a company not based in China. If they didn’t, app stores such as Apple Store and Google Play could legally ban the app and any app made by said company. The US House of Representatives has argued that it doesn’t constitute a ban as ByteDance can save the app by selling it to another non-Chinese company. As of June 2023, federal and state employees in 34 out of 50 states have been forbidden to use the app on government devices.
