Content creators are not happy with a possible ban on TikTok
The case for a separation from the company that owns TikTok: Two years after the viral viral success of “That Midwestern Mom”
Legislation that would force the Chinese company that owns TikTok to sell the company or face a ban in the US is scheduled to go before the House of Representatives on Wednesday.
Two years ago, a video uploaded by “That Midwestern Mom” became one of the hottest videos on TikTok. The ingredients — Snickers bars, apples, Jell-O and Cool Whip — made her a viral sensation.
Other TikTokers use their platform as a means of giving back. William McCoy, who goes by Izzy White, is a former drug dealer and ex-felon from Baltimore. He said that he uses his platform to help homeless people.
“We’re looking for a forced separation, not a ban, so what we’re trying to do is make that happen,” he said. “The TikTok user experience can continue and improve so long as ByteDance doesn’t own the company.”
But Krishnamoorthi says he and other lawmakers reviewed the efforts and says the company’s claims about their safeguards were false. “Whether it was Tiktok saying that ‘oh American user data is not going to be accessible to anyone in China.’ Again, wrong. That was proven false as well. And then they said that American user data is not going to be used to target anybody again. Wrong. That was false.”
Why the House seems ready to ban TikTok and what could come next? Rep. Mike Gallagher says the bipartisan bill is not a ban of the app
The bipartisan measure was unanimously approved last week by the House Energy and Commerce committee. There is a process that requires two-thirds of the House to approve it on the floor.
Rep. Mike Gallagher, R-Wisc., who chairs the House Select committee on China and is the lead GOP sponsor of the bipartisan bill, maintains the bill does not amount to a ban of the video sharing app.
Gallagher says classified and unclassified national security assessments show that the app is a threat to user privacy, that it’s been used to target journalists and interfere in elections. A group of officials from the national security agencies briefed House members on their analysis.
The lobbying campaign that TikTok launched shows why the legislation is needed, according to Gallagher.
Teenagers crying and one threatening suicide, one pretending to be one of my colleague’s sons were some of the calls member offices received. “That, to me demonstrates how the platform could be weaponized in the future.”
If foreign owned apps become a national security threat, the president would be given a process to address them. It also creates a system for users to download their own data and switch to an alternate platform.
The ranking Democrat on the House Select committee on China is from Illinois, and he helped write the bill. He told NPR that there was no first amendment right to harm our national security.
The company is in the process of setting up a firewall to keep users’ data in the U.S., and it stressed that it spent its own money to do it.
Facebook, Twitter and the Economy: Trump’s Decay of the U.S. Economy in a Two-Party Scenario
In 2020 Donald Trump proposed a ban when he was in the White House. But he does not support the House bill.
When he served as president he vowed to ban the social media app. Trump explained his new opposition in an interview with CNBC on Monday, saying that despite his the possible security risk, he opposed a ban because it meant users would move to another platform that he considered more dangerous.
There is a lot of good and there is a lot of bad with TikTok. He does not think that Facebook can be made bigger without TikTok, and he also thinks that Facebook is an enemy of the people.
TikTok is full of videos bashing the U.S. economy. One popular group of posts uses the term “Silent Depression.” The posts show that the country is worse off than it was in 1930. (My colleagues Jeanna Smialek and Jim Tankersley reported on the posts late last year.)
Wall Street Journal: “People Stoked Fear” and “U.S. Senators Want to Become Nazi” after the Sept. 7 Attack
The Wall Street Journal analysis found that after the October 7 attack, Tik Tok flooded users with videos about extreme positions from both sides of the conflict. “Many stoked fear,” The Journal reported. There were videos praising an old Osama bin Laden letter.
The top US intelligence official said on Monday that the Chinese government had used TikTok to spread propaganda and influence elections in the US. China could try to influence the presidential election and cause U.S. societal divisions this year according to the report.
