The United States government has threatened to ban the TikTok app in its territory if its Chinese parent company, Byte Dance, fails to sell its stake in the U.S. version of the app.
The move is reportedly driven by the fear that US user data held by the company could be passed on to China’s government freely.
Additionally, this move is coming after a global backlash to the popular video-based app over concerns about the potential for the Chinese to spy on individuals, with countries including the UK, Canada, and Australia recently proposing to ban the app from government mobile phones.
Meanwhile, according to a report by Axios, the US has already banned TikTok on federal government devices but this move will make it the first time under President Joe Biden’s administration that a potential nationwide ban on TikTok has been threatened as Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump, had previously tried to ban TikTok in 2020 but was blocked by the courts.
Meanwhile, TikTok said on Wednesday, March 15 that the best way to address concerns on national security would be with the transparent, US-based protection of US user data and systems, with robust third-party monitoring, vetting, and then verification.
