The clampdown on Chinese companies by the United States is far from over. This certainly will not stop with Huawei. It appears that the U.S. now sees any “big company” from China as a potential threat. Recent reports show that the U.S. has commenced a comprehensive containment of Chinese technology companies. The U.S. will not only ban hardware companies like Huawei, it will also prohibit Chinese software companies. The latest software company to feel the hammer of the U.S. will probably be TikTok.
There are speculations that the White House intends to completely block TikTok on the basis of “security issues”. Of course, the U.S. ban is usually on the basis of “security issues”. Well, TikTok may have a way out to avoid the U.S. ban – become an American company.
The White House economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, said that he expects TikTok to be stripped from its Chinese parent company ByteDance. For the U.S, it has concerns about the security of data processing on the short video platform. TikTok has to come out of Bytedance and operate as an independent American company. A top White House official believes that this is better than banning.
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This is funny because it appears that the U.S. is trying to coerce TikTok into becoming an American company. If TikTok eventually becomes an American company, its servers will be in the U.S. and not in China.
The U.S. to add TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance to its entity list
However, a “Financial Times” report claims that the White House is also considering the inclusion of ByteDance on the “entity list”. This move will make it particularly difficult for American companies to provide technology for TikTok. This restriction covers software, meaning that Apple and other app stores will not be able to provide TikTok updates through their platforms.
A senior US government official said that the “entity list” is one of the measures under discussion. The US government is weighing how to ensure that other countries do not have access to American personal data. The official said that the US government will reach a conclusion within a month.
The official also said that the U.S. government is aware that TikTok is very popular with the public, so it is also examining whether there is a method that allows people to use TikTok and protect American private data from being accessed.
The US government is also considering citing the International Emergency Economic Power Act of 1977 (IEEPA), which regards TikTok as an “unusual and special threat” to the security of the US state or economy. Although IEEPA allows the US government to use the entity list option, it also lays the foundation for other restrictions on TikTok options.