Vox - What to know about TikTok’s fate in the US https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/community_logos/52517/voxv.png2024-03-14T16:40:00-04:00http://www.vox.com/rss/stream/234173662024-03-14T16:40:00-04:002024-03-14T16:40:00-04:00TikTok could avoid a ban with a sale. Finding a buyer won’t be easy.
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<figcaption>Former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and his wife Louise Linton hold a 2017 sheet of $1 notes bearing Mnuchin’s name for a photograph at the US Bureau of Engraving and Printing in Washington, DC, in 2017. | Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg via Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>Former Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin is among those lining up to buy TikTok if Congress enacts a law that forces its Chinese owner to sell.</p> <p id="gv1zTL">The Senate is now considering a bipartisan bill that could force a sale of <a href="https://www.vox.com/tiktok" data-source="encore">TikTok</a>, with the House having already passed a similar measure and <a href="https://www.vox.com/joe-biden" data-source="encore">President Joe Biden</a> throwing his support behind it. If the legislation is signed into law — and if it survives <a href="https://www.vox.com/politics/24094839/tiktok-ban-bill-congress-pass-biden">likely legal challenges</a> — the question then becomes: Who would buy TikTok?</p>
<p id="H0NhiM">The bill would require the app’s Chinese parent company ByteDance to sell the social media platform within 165 days of the law going into effect or else the platform will be banned from US app stores.</p>
<p id="wkhSc9">But TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew has said that the company wouldn’t go down without a fight: “We will continue to do all we can including exercising our legal rights to protect this amazing platform we have built with you,” he <a href="https://x.com/TikTokPolicy/status/1768045785311035820?s=20">said in a video statement</a> on Wednesday. The Chinese government has also expressed opposition to the bill and would have to <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-03-13/tiktok-ban-or-sale-what-us-bill-means-for-the-app?sref=qYiz2hd0">approve any divestiture plan</a>. </p>
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<p lang="en" dir="ltr">Our CEO Shou Chew's response to the TikTok ban bill: <a href="https://t.co/7AnDYOLD96">pic.twitter.com/7AnDYOLD96</a></p>— TikTok Policy (@TikTokPolicy) <a href="https://twitter.com/TikTokPolicy/status/1768045785311035820?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 13, 2024</a>
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<p id="Gtez7t">TikTok’s US market has a roughly <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/14/tech/buyer-tiktok-for-sale-bytedance/index.html#:~:text=At%20%24100%20billion%2C%20there%20are,certainly%20run%20into%20regulatory%20roadblocks.">$100 billion</a> valuation by some estimates, however, and investors believe that ByteDance could ultimately consider a sale as a last resort. </p>
<p id="tL64Jg">The companies with the resources to buy TikTok outright probably can’t do so because of <a href="https://www.vox.com/antitrust" data-source="encore">antitrust</a> concerns, though. And if they can’t buy it, it’s not clear anybody else could pull together the money to make an alternative offer.</p>
<p id="bWzunc">Still, some individual investors have expressed interest in putting together a group bid for the company. If any of the prospective buyers hold controlling stakes or seats on the board of competing tech firms, however, that could potentially raise antitrust concerns, said <a href="https://law.utexas.edu/faculty/abraham-l-wickelgren/">Abraham L. Wickelgren</a>, a professor at the University of Texas Law School specializing in antitrust and law and economics.</p>
<p id="NUKQp3">Steven Mnuchin, the former US Treasury secretary during the <a href="https://www.vox.com/trump-administration" data-source="encore">Trump administration</a> and current head of Liberty Strategic Capital, says he supports the bill and is gathering investors to buy TikTok. “It’s a great business and I’m going to put together a group to buy TikTok,” he <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2024/03/14/former-treasury-secretary-mnuchin-is-putting-together-an-investor-group-to-buy-tiktok.html?taid=65f2e855a60cbb000181a9b6&utm_campaign=trueanthem&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter%7Cmain">told CNBC on Thursday</a>. “This should be owned by US businesses. There’s no way that the Chinese would ever let a US company own something like this in China.”</p>
<p id="9BgOUP">Bobby Kotick, former CEO of the gaming titan Activision Blizzard, is also looking for potential partners in a deal, according to the <a href="https://www.wsj.com/tech/why-the-new-effort-to-ban-tiktok-caught-fire-with-lawmakers-7cd3f980">Wall Street Journal</a>. But it’s not clear who Mnuchin or Kotick’s partner investors could be or what their preexisting holdings are. </p>
<p id="LTzfYs">“TikTok is a juggernaut — someone will want to buy it,” said <a href="https://feinternational.com/team/thomas-smale/">Thomas Smale</a>, CEO of the mergers and acquisitions advisory firm FE International. “They only have a few months to find a deal — obviously not an ideal situation for TikTok, but a great opportunity for investors looking to capitalize.”</p>
<h3 id="WZ3z1O">Could Google or Meta buy TikTok?</h3>
<p id="vy8Su4"><a href="https://www.vox.com/google" data-source="encore">Google</a> parent company <a href="https://www.vox.com/alphabet" data-source="encore">Alphabet</a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/meta" data-source="encore">Meta</a> are some of the only companies capable of single-handedly paying TikTok’s price tag at its current $100 billion valuation. </p>
<p id="FQLddA">Google CEO Sundar Pichar <a href="https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/google-ceo-sundar-pichai-rules-out-buying-tiktok-1.1485333">previously ruled out</a> buying TikTok in 2020 when former <a href="https://www.vox.com/donald-trump" data-source="encore">President Donald Trump</a> was trying to ban the app. (However, the company reportedly considered joining a group bid as a minority investor at the time.) Meta CEO <a href="https://www.vox.com/mark-zuckerberg" data-source="encore">Mark Zuckerberg</a> <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ryanmac/zuckerberg-musically-tiktok-china-facebook">previously tried</a> to buy ByteDance and TikTok’s predecessor Musical.ly, which later merged with TikTok to create the app as it’s known today, before he started decrying TikTok as a threat to <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-ceo-mark-zuckerberg-stoked-washingtons-fears-about-tiktok-11598223133">American values and tech supremacy</a>. </p>
<p id="CZJCe3">But even if either company has an interest in buying TikTok, the acquisition would likely raise antitrust concerns. Both Meta and Google have <a href="https://digiday.com/marketing/how-google-meta-and-snaps-battle-with-tiktok-in-short-form-video-is-playing-out/">sought to compete with TikTok</a> in the short-form video space by introducing <a href="https://www.vox.com/instagram-news" data-source="encore">Instagram</a> Reels and <a href="https://www.vox.com/youtube" data-source="encore">YouTube</a> Shorts, respectively. </p>
<p id="nGrArx">“I think any potential acquisition by another social media company, such as Meta, would raise substantial antitrust concern, and is almost certain to draw intense regulatory scrutiny, particularly given the [Federal Trade Commission’s] willingness to look closely at concentration in technology industries,” said <a href="https://www.law.berkeley.edu/our-faculty/faculty-profiles/tejas-narechania/">Tejas Narechania</a>, faculty director of the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology. “On the other hand, I do think it is unlikely that a small company will have the resources to acquire TikTok.”</p>
<p id="1710521624.959739">The FTC has brought antitrust cases against Meta in the past, including an unsuccessful attempt<strong> </strong>to block its acquisition of the <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/ftc-loses-antitrust-challenge-to-facebook-parent-meta-11675272525">virtual-reality startup Within Unlimited</a> and a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/legal/transactional/ftc-can-reopen-meta-privacy-case-despite-5-bln-fine-court-rules-2024-03-13/#:~:text=March%2013%20(Reuters)%20%2D%20Meta,to%20a%20range%20of%20safeguards.">reopened one</a><strong> </strong>to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-appeals-court-rejects-bid-by-states-revive-antitrust-lawsuit-against-facebook-2023-04-27/">force it to sell Instagram</a>. (The first failed after a federal court found that the government had not provided <a href="https://apnews.com/article/technology-meta-platforms-inc-production-facilities-business-8a80845f7d328c3ba0ab4f4dfa71b642">sufficient evidence</a> that consumers would have directly benefited had Meta entered the VR market itself instead of acquiring Within Unlimited, and in the second case, a federal judge decided that the government had not proven that <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2021/06/28/judge-dismisses-ftc-antitrust-complaint-against-facebook.html">Meta was operating a monopoly</a>.) Google is also staring down two major antitrust cases brought by the Justice Department concerning its <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/12/technology/google-antitrust-cases.html">search engine</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/24/technology/google-ads-lawsuit.html">online ad business</a>, both of which will likely be decided this year. </p>
<p id="k272MP">Even if Google or Meta were allowed to go through with a deal, it could take longer than the 165-day period specified in the bill during which ByteDance would have to divest, Wickelgren said. That may force the company to focus on other buyers who can complete a sale more quickly, if the legislation currently being considered by <a href="https://www.vox.com/congress" data-source="encore">Congress</a> does become law.</p>
<p id="uad48N">“It’s possible that you could get a merger review of this magnitude in that time, but it’d be tough. They’d certainly be motivated to comply quickly,” he said. “There would probably be a push for a buyer with significantly less antitrust concerns where maybe they could get a deal approved by the DOJ or the FTC more quickly.”</p>
<p id="uJVxyX"><em><strong>Clarification, March 15, 1:10 pm ET: </strong></em><em>This story, originally published March 14, has been updated to clarify the state of the FTC’s suit against Meta over Instagram. That case was dismissed in 2021 but later permitted to be reopened.</em></p>
https://www.vox.com/technology/2024/3/14/24101155/tiktok-ban-mnuchin-senate-china-shou-metaNicole Narea2024-03-14T13:40:00-04:002024-03-14T13:40:00-04:00It’s not just Gen Z. Here’s what TikTok’s user base tells us about a potential ban’s impact.
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<img alt="A woman in a group of protesters holds up a sign that reads “ TikTok changed my life for the better,” while another sign is visible behind her reading “TikTok helped me grow my business.” The US Capitol is visible behind the group." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/vYKnpvjRxhZx1uaO7VxgxYS-AvQ=/857x0:7701x5133/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73207274/2076695817.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>Supporters of the TikTok app demonstrate outside of the US Capitol before the House of Representatives votes to pass the “Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act,” that could ban TikTok in the US, on March 13. | Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>The app skews younger, its users appear more politically polarized, and its user base is changing.</p> <p id="qBppJW">The odds of a ban on <a href="https://www.vox.com/tiktok" data-source="encore">TikTok</a> becoming a reality have never been this good.</p>
<p id="gTR88E">The House of Representatives passed a bill to force a sale of the Chinese-owned app <a href="https://www.vox.com/politics/24094839/tiktok-ban-bill-congress-pass-biden">by a massive bipartisan margin</a> on Wednesday — and the effort has some bipartisan support in the Senate, as well as the backing of <a href="https://www.vox.com/joe-biden" data-source="encore">President Joe Biden</a>.</p>
<p id="Y9EHXV">The vote came despite <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/1/17/23552716/tiktok-ban-cfius-bytedance">a long-running lobbying effort</a> by the app’s parent company, ByteDance, to assuage lawmakers’ <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/2/2/23582202/tiktok-headquarters-press-accountability-ban-trump">concerns over privacy and national security</a>. That effort escalated last week when the app pushed its users to call and email their representatives, urging them to vote against the bill. The effort may have backfired, as callers <a href="https://x.com/RepDean/status/1768009715437412352?s=20">flooded</a> congressional <a href="https://x.com/metzgov/status/1767944208386515356?s=20">phone lines</a> and tipped ambivalent lawmakers into voting for the bill — but it also revealed the loyalty of the app’s user base. </p>
<p id="5UGUrZ">But who exactly would be affected by such a bill? Though <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2024/01/31/americans-social-media-use/">a third of American adults</a> report being TikTok users, that user base has undergone some interesting changes since the platform rose to prominence in the pandemic era. Its user base is growing, but not necessarily in the most predictable way. And its users might actually have different views than the average, non-TikTokking American — lending some credence to critics’ arguments that the platform may be having an effect on how its users view the world.</p>
<h3 id="413UU0">The platform has been dominated by the youngest Americans — but they aren’t fueling its growth now</h3>
<p id="u4ulbQ">What has always set TikTok apart from other social media platforms is how quickly it grew. The pandemic is largely behind this boom: It took TikTok two years to get to the 40 million monthly American users it had entering 2020, according to figures <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/24/tiktok-reveals-us-global-user-growth-numbers-for-first-time.html">released that year by the company</a>. In the following eight months, it more than doubled that number, and it reported more than 100 million monthly users by August 2020.</p>
<p id="gD3GB4">Most of those users skewed young — and the user base continues to be younger than the rest of the country. The youngest American adults are much more likely to use TikTok than their older cohorts: 62 percent of 18 to 29-year-olds report using TikTok, compared to 39 percent of 30-49 year olds, 24 percent of 50-64 year olds, and 10 percent of those older than 65, according to a <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2024/01/31/americans-social-media-use/">comprehensive Pew Research Center study</a> in 2023. And of all social media apps, TikTok is the platform that young users report using the most, only behind the mainstays of <a href="https://www.vox.com/youtube" data-source="encore">YouTube</a>, <a href="https://www.vox.com/facebook" data-source="encore">Facebook</a>, and <a href="https://www.vox.com/instagram-news" data-source="encore">Instagram</a>.</p>
<p id="A2klkg">That survey also documented an important change happening within the app’s user base: it’s getting older. TikTok users aged 18-29 increased by 14 percent from <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2021/04/07/social-media-use-in-2021/">2021</a> to <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2024/01/31/americans-social-media-use/">2023</a>. But among millennials (those aged 30-49), TikTok usage rose by 17 percent — outpacing growth among younger users.</p>
<p id="wqbydy">“So while TikTok use is still most prevalent among that youngest cohort … it’s seen the most growth among those aged 30-49,” Pew computation social scientist <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/staff/samuel-bestvater/">Samuel Bestvater</a> told me. </p>
<h3 id="KZXCuB">Not everyone who uses TikTok posts videos on TikTok </h3>
<p id="Y8CBpx">A little over half of adult TikTok users have <em>ever</em> posted a video, and as of the end of 2023, 35- to 49-year-olds are more likely to have posted than people 18 to 34. More jarringly, it’s only about a quarter of TikTok users who make 98 percent, or nearly all, the TikToks that can be publicly viewed. So it’s a small number of agenda setters and <a href="https://www.vox.com/influencers" data-source="encore">influencers</a> who are actually driving conversations and trends on the app — and they’re probably older than you expect. This trend also aligns with a finding by the tech writer Ryan Broderick, who last month <a href="https://www.garbageday.email/p/tiktok-millennials-turns">documented the other signs</a> that TikTok is aging. </p>
<p id="sGn2Ic">That same Pew report also found some other interesting demographic differences in who is likely to be a TikTok user. Hispanic adults are more likely to be users (49 percent of Hispanic adults report using the app) and women also report using the app at higher rates — about 40 percent of female adults use TikTok, compared to 25 percent of men.</p>
<h3 id="QtzZul">What are the politics of Tiktok’s users?</h3>
<p id="j91ddd">Pew hasn’t yet been able to determine exactly what kind of content these creators are putting out into the world, but through separate public polling it’s possible to see what kind of an effect this media is having on its users. As more Americans, and particularly younger people, <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/11/15/more-americans-are-getting-news-on-tiktok-bucking-the-trend-seen-on-most-other-social-media-sites/">report using TikTok</a> as a primary source for news and information, it’s becoming evident that the app isn’t a neutral arbiter of information for all its users, and is potentially helping its users form different opinions than non-users. </p>
<p id="RmLRRO">In <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/poll-numbers-help-explain-bidens-camp-joined-tiktok-rcna138489">two</a> national <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/meetthepressblog/one-five-voters-use-tiktok-daily-poll-finds-rcna126223">NBC News tracking polls</a>, TikTok users report having starkly different perspectives on political issues than non-TikTok users, specifically in how favorably President Joe Biden is viewed, and how his handling of <a href="https://www.vox.com/israel" data-source="encore">Israel</a>’s war in <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/11/20/18080046/gaza-palestine-israel" data-source="encore">Gaza</a> is viewed.</p>
<p id="2WjT5G">Those differences are more pronounced among younger voters, though the polls don’t break down these differences by gender or race: In both the <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/meetthepressblog/one-five-voters-use-tiktok-daily-poll-finds-rcna126223">November 2023</a> and <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/poll-numbers-help-explain-bidens-camp-joined-tiktok-rcna138489">January 2024</a> polls, young TikTok users viewed Biden significantly less favorably than non-users, with a 6 percentage point gap in November and a 10 point gap in January. </p>
<p id="5gkirE">Similar gaps show up in their preference for which party controls <a href="https://www.vox.com/congress" data-source="encore">Congress</a>, and whether they would back Biden over Trump. Young TikTok users backed congressional Democrats by 16 points in both months, a much larger margin than the essentially tied result among young non-TikTok users. And in the Biden-Trump head-to-head polling, the polling is a little more mixed, but young TikTokers have gotten less warm on Biden since November, while non-TikTokers have started to back Biden over Trump.</p>
<p id="tp8hHX">That might partially be because younger TikTok users could be holding stronger political opinions and political beliefs at either end of the ideological spectrum than non-TikTok users: They report they are both much more Democratic than non-users, and more likely to “identify with the MAGA movement.” That younger Americans skew to the left is well-known in American politics in general, but the difference in how young TikTok users view specific issues suggests a specific kind of sorting happening for these users. What’s less clear is that there is causality here — is the app specifically pushing these younger users toward opposite poles, or might specific subgroups of users already be prone to being more politically polarized than non-users?</p>
<p id="BbxCce">This dynamic might be the most significant warning sign for how TikTok users view politics: based on who is using this app, how they are using it, and how they are thinking about politics, it isn’t impossible to imagine that they are being pulled into more polarized positions, aided by algorithms pushing like-minded content to them, and being consumed passively, but constantly. But more research is necessary to understand how these algorithms are pushing political content.</p>
https://www.vox.com/24100812/tiktok-ban-congress-bill-impact-senate-stakes-bytedance-china-gen-zChristian Paz2024-03-14T06:30:00-04:002024-03-14T06:30:00-04:00Banning TikTok would be both ineffective and harmful
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<img alt="A photograph of TikTok supporters standing outside the US Capitol. They are holding signs supportive of TikTok, reading “TikTok Helped Me Grow My Business” and other similar messages. One supporter is taking a selfie and smiling." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/bVfOPwvj9YdDXkNt4TMgu-V7OYk=/459x0:7811x5514/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73206116/2074368670.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>The US House passed a bill that could ban the social video app, but sending TikTok into the ether won’t make social media any safer </p> <p id="bzpwKd"><a href="https://www.vox.com/tiktok" data-source="encore">TikTok</a>, like any place on the internet where a ton of people are watching and sharing and competing for attention, is best understood in terms of both/and. </p>
<p id="UwieRu">TikTok is both a vital <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2023/12/4/23984175/tiktok-illness-influencers">platform for community building</a> and<em> </em>plagued by <a href="https://www.vox.com/technology/2023/7/29/23811639/tiktok-borax-challenge-dangerous-laundry-detergent">dangerous misinformation</a>. TikTok is both<em> </em>uniquely good at providing a means for non-<a href="https://www.vox.com/influencers" data-source="encore">influencers</a> to reach a huge audience<em> </em>and<em> </em>a platform that has <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/07/13/1028401/tiktok-censorship-mistakes-glitches-apologies-endless-cycle/">failed</a>, again and <a href="https://www.mediamatters.org/tiktok/tiktok-failing-contain-violent-beheading-content-its-platform">again,</a> to fairly and adequately moderate the content posted there. TikTok is<em> </em>both<em> </em>riddled with huge <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/24/tech/tiktok-ban-national-security-hearing/index.html">concerns</a> about the privacy of the <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-data-privacy/">data</a> it collects on its users<em> </em>and, <a href="https://www.vox.com/technology/2023/11/9/23952361/meta-whistleblower-kosa-instagram-teens-congress">just like any other</a> major <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/x-alternatives-user-privacy-report/">social media platform</a>, intent on collecting that data as part of its business model. </p>
<p id="EQKGXV">On Wednesday morning, the House of Representatives <a href="https://www.vox.com/politics/24094839/tiktok-ban-bill-congress-pass-biden">overwhelmingly voted</a> to pass a bill that could eventually lead to a US ban of the app. Before we get there, <a href="https://www.vox.com/politics/24094839/tiktok-ban-bill-congress-pass-biden">some big ifs are in play</a>: if the Senate also passes the legislation, if<em> </em><a href="https://www.vox.com/joe-biden" data-source="encore">President Joe Biden</a> follows through on his intention to sign it should the bill arrive on his desk, and<em> </em>if TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, doesn’t successfully sell TikTok to a non-Chinese owner before the legislation’s specified deadline. </p>
<p id="otX27d">Still, the threat of a ban was real enough to prompt TikTok to take action. In a push notification sent to users last week, TikTok urged its users to “speak up now — before your government strips 170 million Americans of their constitutional right to free expression.” </p>
<p id="3Q3Wus">As a result, some House offices were inundated with calls, and some lawmakers who supported the bill accused TikTok of using the app to start a “<a href="https://twitter.com/CongressmanRaja/status/1765790980488270155">propaganda campaign</a>.” That language resonates with <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/11/13/tiktok-facebook-instagram-gaza-hastags/">Republican calls late last year to ban TikTok</a>, citing a viral but <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/23997305/tiktok-palestine-israel-gaza-war">unfounded</a> accusation that TikTok’s Chinese owners were “brainwashing” America’s youth with anti-<a href="https://www.vox.com/israel" data-source="encore">Israel</a> content by forcing it to get views thanks to the platform’s powerful recommendation algorithms. </p>
<h3 id="Yu9CqX">The gray area of TikTok</h3>
<p id="IYdggN">One of the challenges of writing about social media is that both/and isn’t nearly as catchy as framing, say, TikTok as wholly good or wholly evil. TikTok’s counter-campaign to lawmakers’ push to frame the app as a data-guzzling Chinese propaganda tool is to point to the creators who make a living on the platform sharing educational, humorous, and otherwise wholesome content. Many of those creators<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/03/13/tik-tok-ban-react-creators/"> are themselves speaking out</a> about how the platform changed their life or helped them find a voice or earned them money. </p>
<p id="SpGRiR">Here are a couple both/ands about the bill to <a href="https://www.vox.com/2023/3/23/23653325/tiktok-ban-us-china-congress" data-source="encore">ban TikTok</a>: It is both<em> </em>a bill that would potentially upend the livelihoods of people who use the platform as an income source and<em> </em>a bill that would not adequately protect user data across social media. It is both<em> </em>a bill that could have serious consequences for online expression and<em> </em>a bill that seems to be created by people with little understanding of what TikTok actually does. </p>
<p id="ocFHGR">“I have yet to hear policymakers talk about TikTok in a way that makes me think they know anything about it,” said Casey Fiesler, an associate professor of information science at the University of Colorado Boulder. </p>
<p id="UU0Usd">Fiesler, who herself has nearly 115,000 followers on TikTok, expressed frustration that policymakers pushing for a ban of the app routinely cited issues that are “absolutely not unique to TikTok,” such as content moderation, algorithmic unfairness, and <a href="https://www.vox.com/privacy" data-source="encore">data privacy</a> concerns. “The thing that’s unique to TikTok is their relationship to <a href="https://www.vox.com/china" data-source="encore">China</a>,” she added, “which is what makes them concerned about those particular things, I guess.” </p>
<p id="rO83nE">As Jason Koebler wrote in his extremely smart essay on all this at <a href="https://www.404media.co/the-u-s-wants-to-ban-tiktok-for-the-sins-of-every-social-media-company/">404 Media</a>, “TikTok and the specter of China’s control of it has become a blank canvas for which anyone who has any complaint about social media to paint their argument on.” Sacrificing TikTok isn’t going to save anyone from the deeper problems of social media and algorithmic power. It just might make some lawmakers and advocates pushing for a TikTok ban feel good about themselves. </p>
<p id="M9y4uJ">And,<em> and</em>, yeeting TikTok out of the landscape of social media platforms will hurt a lot of people. TikTok is an enormous hub for activism, Fiesler noted. The site is designed to show users things they want to see, and it’s better at it than a lot of other competitors, such as <a href="https://www.vox.com/instagram-news" data-source="encore">Instagram</a> Reels. </p>
<p id="E448H2">Sure, the encroachment of the TikTok Shop on the For You Pages of many users has fundamentally changed the experience of being there, but the app remains a powerful tool for community building. </p>
<h3 id="dp3cn9">What happens if TikTok goes</h3>
<p id="HMgnSs">If TikTok vanishes, some of the platform’s most successful, full-time creators will be able to find success elsewhere, on Reels or <a href="https://www.vox.com/youtube" data-source="encore">YouTube</a> or streaming. Some already have. </p>
<p id="Qh1xjq">The biggest loss, though, will likely not be felt by people who can make a living as “creators” or “influencers” entirely; a lot of people who make money on TikTok do so almost part-time. </p>
<p id="K0vdiS">Because TikTok’s algorithms remain skilled at allowing users with small followings to potentially find huge audiences, there are a ton of people on the platform who “don’t have the audience that could help them evolve into other areas of the entertainment industry,” said Zari A. Taylor, a doctoral candidate at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill who studies media and culture. </p>
<p id="2ZM5xw">I like TikTok. I use it. I send way too many videos from the app to my friends. It can be, at its best, a place capable of fostering <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2023/12/4/23984175/tiktok-illness-influencers">deep community and meaning</a>. I’ve also covered some of the really bad stuff that TikTok amplifies to users, like videos about <a href="https://www.vox.com/technology/2023/7/29/23811639/tiktok-borax-challenge-dangerous-laundry-detergent">drinking Borax</a> and Shop listings for snake oil “cures” <a href="https://www.vox.com/technology/23902094/tiktok-shop-wellness-trend-castor-oil">that the company profits from</a>. </p>
<p id="S8yYkA">It’s not a great idea to break up the both/and of TikTok. TikTok is both a valuable space and a platform that deserves deep scrutiny. But vaporizing it is not the solution. </p>
<p id="z9qoua"><em>A version of this story was published in the Vox Technology newsletter. </em><a href="https://www.vox.com/pages/newsletters"><em><strong>Sign up here</strong></em></a><em> so you don’t miss the next one!</em></p>
https://www.vox.com/technology/24100104/banning-tiktok-us-senate-ineffective-and-harmful-billA.W. Ohlheiser2024-03-13T11:29:02-04:002024-03-13T11:29:02-04:00Is the new push to ban TikTok for real?
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<img alt="A phone held in two hands displays the TikTok logo." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/sw6IBAluYCM7l5T4tJxOuoBMEVQ=/350x0:4151x2851/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73193728/1479771697.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>Due to security concerns, the Chinese-owned video app TikTok has already been banned from US government devices. | Matt Cardy/Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>The House passed a bill to ban TikTok on Wednesday. But it’s not over yet.</p> <p id="RCLXpE">The House passed an audacious bill on Wednesday that could potentially ban the social media app <a href="https://www.vox.com/tiktok">TikTok</a>, generating a furor on Capitol Hill and online.</p>
<p id="XJFWtm">President Joe Biden has said he will <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/03/08/tiktok-ban-biden-sign-congress-trump/">sign the bill</a> if passed. But it still needs to clear the Senate, where discussions are underway to draft companion legislation. </p>
<p id="OUSotW">Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) will be at the center of the charge in the Senate and has been coordinating with the bill’s House sponsors as well as his Republican counterpart on the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), a Senate aide familiar with the discussions told Vox. </p>
<p id="LrFZGm">Warner thinks the House version isn’t a perfect bill: He’s been advocating for<a href="https://www.warner.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2023/3/senators-introduce-bipartisan-bill-to-tackle-national-security-threats-from-foreign-tech"> broader legislation</a> that would also rein in other foreign tech companies. But he believes that it’s currently Congress’s best shot at getting something passed to protect Americans’ digital privacy, the aide said. It would have to pass the Senate by unanimous consent, or else get referred to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, where it would likely stall, according to the aide.</p>
<p id="h9dw48">However, the bill — which would require TikTok’s Chinese parent company ByteDance to divest from the app within 165 days or else it will be removed from US app stores — is already facing some opposition in the Senate, which could doom the effort. Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/03/12/tik-tok-bill-house-vote/">told the Washington Post</a> on Tuesday that he would oppose any measure that violates the Constitution and that Congress should not be “trying to take away the First Amendment rights of [170] million Americans.” </p>
<p id="htX2Zt">To that end, there has already been a revolt from users. Last week, the social media app told its users to call their members of Congress in protest of the new <a href="https://selectcommitteeontheccp.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/selectcommitteeontheccp.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/Protecting%20Americans%20From%20Foriegn%20Adversary%20Controlled%20Applications_3.5.24.pdf">bipartisan bill</a>, arguing that a ban would infringe on their constitutional right to free expression and harm businesses and creators across the country. </p>
<p id="zpqabS">Teens and older people alike reportedly pleaded with congressional staff, <a href="https://x.com/Olivia_Beavers/status/1765778091278778697?s=20">saying they spend all day on the app</a>. Creators posted on TikTok urging their followers to do the same. Some offices decided to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/mar/07/tiktok-users-protest-congress-potential-ban">temporarily shut down their phone lines</a> as a result, which meant that they couldn’t field calls from their constituents about other issues either. </p>
<div id="c9ogSH">
<blockquote class="tiktok-embed" cite="https://www.tiktok.com/@anthonyallistair/video/7343426799516405035" data-video-id="7343426799516405035" data-embed-from="oembed" style="max-width: 605px;min-width: 325px;"> <section> <a target="_blank" title="@anthonyallistair" href="https://www.tiktok.com/@anthonyallistair?refer=embed">@anthonyallistair</a> <p><a title="greenscreen" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/greenscreen?refer=embed">#greenscreen</a> <a title="tiktokshutdown" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/tiktokshutdown?refer=embed">#tiktokshutdown</a> <a title="tiktokban" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/tiktokban?refer=embed">#tiktokban</a> <a title="tiktokshutdown2024" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/tiktokshutdown2024?refer=embed">#tiktokshutdown2024</a> <a title="popculture" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/popculture?refer=embed">#popculture</a> <a title="creatorsoftiktok" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/creatorsoftiktok?refer=embed">#creatorsoftiktok</a> <a title="breakingnews" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/breakingnews?refer=embed">#breakingnews</a> <a title="usa" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/usa?refer=embed">#usa</a> <a title="fyp" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/fyp?refer=embed">#fyp</a> </p> <a target="_blank" title="♬ original sound - #Californiaguy" href="https://www.tiktok.com/music/original-sound-7343426921717435179?refer=embed">♬ original sound - #Californiaguy</a> </section> </blockquote> <script async="" src="https://www.tiktok.com/embed.js"></script>
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<p id="eA4fU1">Lawmakers in both parties <a href="https://x.com/Olivia_Beavers/status/1765813340310270456?s=20">didn’t take kindly to the impromptu lobbying frenzy</a>. Some characterized it as confirmation of their fears that the Chinese-owned app — which is <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tiktok-banned-us-government-where-else-around-the-world/">already banned on government devices</a> — is brainwashing America. The overrun phone lines were merely “making the case” for the bill, Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) <a href="https://x.com/chiproytx/status/1765779738931404936?s=20">wrote on X</a>.</p>
<p id="h4SS41">The bill passed the House Wednesday with a vote of 352-65, well above the two-thirds majority threshold required. The White House has backed the bill from the beginning, reportedly providing <a href="https://punchbowl.news/article/gallagher-krishnamoorthi-tiktok-bill-gets-white-house-backing/">technical support</a> to legislators when they were drafting it (even as Biden’s reelection campaign has <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2024/02/12/biden-campaign-debuts-official-tiktok.html">started using TikTok for voter outreach</a>).</p>
<p id="2k00R9">Though the bill now has momentum, there’s the crucial question of whether it would survive legal scrutiny even if passed. A federal court recently overturned a <a href="https://www.vox.com/politics/2023/5/18/23728598/montana-tiktok-ban-bytedance-china-enforcement">Montana law</a> that sought to ban TikTok. Though legislators sponsoring the US House bill argue that it is narrow in scope and would not amount to a total ban on TikTok that would violate the First Amendment, some legal experts believe otherwise. </p>
<p id="VwKJnD">“In my view, this loaded gun is a ban in all but name, and banning TikTok is obviously unconstitutional,” said Ramya Krishnan, a staff attorney at the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. “This ban on TikTok is materially the same [as the Montana ban] in all the ways that matter.”</p>
<h3 id="sAmq0J">Can Congress ban TikTok?</h3>
<p id="KFoltL">The constitutional law here appears straightforward: Congress can’t outright ban TikTok or any social media platform unless it can prove that it poses legitimate and serious privacy and <a href="https://www.vox.com/defense-and-security" data-source="encore">national security</a> concerns that can’t be addressed by any other means. The bar for such a justification is necessarily very high in order to protect Americans’ First Amendment rights, Krishnan said. </p>
<p id="oS9okz">Lawmakers argue that the bill under consideration isn’t actually a total ban. Rather, it would enact a new authority to ban apps in “narrowly defined situations” when they are controlled by a foreign adversary, New Jersey Rep. Frank Pallone, the ranking Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee, <a href="https://democrats-energycommerce.house.gov/media/press-releases/pallone-remarks-markup-legislation-protect-americans-data-and-national">said</a> before the committee Thursday. He compared the bill to historical efforts to prevent foreign ownership of US airwaves due to national security concerns. </p>
<p id="MPb4Q4">“It is no different here, and I take the concerns raised by the intelligence community very seriously,” he said.</p>
<p id="sTj8bU">Other House lawmakers have <a href="https://selectcommitteeontheccp.house.gov/media/press-releases/gallagher-bipartisan-coalition-introduce-legislation-protect-americans-0">criticized TikTok</a> for attempting to portray the bill as a total ban.</p>
<p id="Yp9W97">But legal experts say that an indirect ban may still be unconstitutional under the First Amendment. Civil society groups including the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) <a href="https://cdt.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Coalition_Letter_Opposing_H.R._7521.pdf">wrote in a recent letter to federal lawmakers</a> that jeopardizing access to TikTok — “home to massive amounts of protected speech and association” — also “jeopardizes access to free expression.” There are also arguably less restrictive and more effective means of protecting any national security interests at stake in this bill, they asserted, considering the Chinese government could continue to access Americans’ data in other ways. </p>
<p id="ed5jtm">“This bill would functionally ban the distribution of TikTok in the United States, and would grant the President broad new powers to ban other social media platforms based on their country of origin,” they said in the letter. </p>
<p id="ntfZF5">Many experts believe it is unlikely that the government will be able to meet the high standard to prove that TikTok poses privacy and national security concerns that can’t otherwise be resolved, said Kate Ruane, director of CDT’s Free Expression Project. Lawmakers have publicly cited concerns about the Chinese government using the app to <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/china-espionage-tiktok-spying-national-security/">spy on Americans</a> and to spread propaganda that could be used to <a href="https://time.com/6836078/tiktok-sold-banned-2024-election/">influence the 2024 presidential election</a>. </p>
<p id="ANB3Yj">Though TikTok has repeatedly insisted that it has never shared user data with the Chinese government nor been asked to do so, a former employee of ByteDance has alleged in court that the government had nevertheless <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/08/tech/tiktok-data-china/index.html">accessed such data</a> on a widespread basis for political purposes during the 2018 protests in Hong Kong. And in December, TikTok parent company ByteDance acknowledged it had fired four employees who <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/12/22/tiktoks-chinese-owner-fires-workers-who-gathered-data-journalists/">accessed the data of two journalists</a> while trying to track down an internal leaker.</p>
<p id="5ht40f">But so far, members of Congress have not provided concrete proof for their claims about Chinese digital espionage and seem to have little interest in offering any transparency: Before the committee voted to advance the bill Thursday, lawmakers had a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/technology/new-push-congress-ban-tiktok-or-force-chinese-divestiture-gains-steam-2024-03-07/">closed-door classified briefing</a> on national security concerns associated with TikTok. </p>
<p id="SATlU3">“TikTok is Communist Chinese malware that is poisoning the minds of our next generation and giving the CCP unfettered access to troves of Americans’ data,” Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) said in a statement. “We cannot allow the CCP to continue to harness this digital weapon.”</p>
<p id="89RyJb">However, national security experts have also questioned the rationale behind a ban. Mike German, a former FBI special agent and fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice’s Liberty and National Security Program, <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2023/3/28/bid-to-ban-tiktok-raises-hypocrisy-charge-amid-global-spying#:~:text=%E2%80%9CWhen%20somebody%20puts%20the%20TikTok,Security%20Program%2C%20told%20Al%20Jazeera">told Al Jazeera</a> that, like many American apps, TikTok collects data on its users that a foreign government could theoretically use for its own hostile purposes. But those governments could just as well buy Americans’ data on a legitimate open market, where the sale of that data remains unrestricted. </p>
<p id="TWcUp1">And even if lawmakers did provide more evidence of national security concerns, it’s still not clear that the ban would pass legal muster. </p>
<p id="BIj1FU">Courts have already applied strict scrutiny to previous attempts to ban TikTok. A federal judge <a href="https://www.npr.org/2023/11/30/1205735647/montana-tiktok-ban-blocked-state">blocked the Montana TikTok ban</a> — which also imposed a financial penalty on TikTok and any app store hosting it each time a user accesses or is offered the ability to access the app — before it was scheduled to go into effect in November. </p>
<p id="1h8j3M">Montana lawmakers justified the ban as a means of protecting the privacy interests of consumers in the state. But US District Judge Donald Molloy wrote in his ruling that the law overstepped the Montana legislature’s powers and left “little doubt that Montana’s legislature and Attorney General were more interested in targeting <a href="https://www.vox.com/china" data-source="encore">China</a>’s ostensible role in TikTok than with protecting Montana consumers.”</p>
<p id="RgSXhf">Former <a href="https://www.vox.com/donald-trump" data-source="encore">President Donald Trump</a> also twice tried to ban TikTok via executive action, only for courts to <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/12/07/944039053/u-s-judge-halts-trumps-tiktok-ban-the-2nd-court-to-fully-block-the-action">strike down his proposal</a> both times. However, he changed his tune Thursday, arguing that banning TikTok would <a href="https://www.axios.com/2024/03/08/trump-claims-tiktok-ban-would-only-help-enemy-facebook">benefit Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook</a>, which he referred to in a post on his social media platform Truth Social as a “true enemy of the people.” </p>
<h3 id="u3nO0q">What lawmakers could do instead of banning TikTok</h3>
<p id="AoqlaZ">If lawmakers are serious about protecting privacy and national security, Ruane said, they should instead pass comprehensive digital privacy legislation. </p>
<p id="fO55de">“That would be a better path forward,” she said. </p>
<p id="oEPPqh">Her organization, the Center for Democracy and Technology, has supported a bipartisan bill that <a href="https://energycommerce.house.gov/posts/bipartisan-ec-leaders-hail-committee-passage-of-the-american-data-privacy-and-protection-act">passed a committee vote</a> in 2022: the <a href="https://www.commerce.senate.gov/services/files/9BA7EF5C-7554-4DF2-AD05-AD940E2B3E50">American Data Privacy and Protection Act</a>. It included provisions requiring companies to allow consumers to consent to or reject the collection of their data, to allow consumers to download and delete the data being collected on them, to require consumers’ affirmative consent to share that data with a third party, and more. </p>
<p id="fEyVaf">It was the culmination of a decades-long effort to regulate the collection, use, and sale of consumer data, similar to the <a href="https://www.vox.com/european-union" data-source="encore">European Union</a>’s <a href="https://gdpr.eu/what-is-gdpr/">regulatory efforts</a>. It would have <a href="https://www.law.umaryland.edu/content/articles/name-659578-en.html">tasked</a> the Federal Trade Commission and state attorneys general with enforcing the law and preempted the patchwork of privacy laws that have been enacted at the state level in the absence of comprehensive federal legislation. </p>
<p id="Kuqszf">However, the privacy bill stalled in Congress and was not reintroduced; Ruane said it’s unclear why. Now lawmakers are moving forward instead with the bill that could ban TikTok — without solving the underlying <a href="https://www.vox.com/privacy">privacy concerns</a>.</p>
<p id="2ePb4a">“This bill would fail to protect us from the many threats to our digital privacy posed by criminals, private companies, and foreign actors,” said David Greene, civil liberties director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “Comprehensive data privacy legislation is the solution we need — not bans of certain categories of apps.”</p>
<p id="UPAhJN"><em><strong>Update, March 13, 11:30 am: </strong></em><em>This story, originally published March 9, has been updated multiple times, most recently with additional reporting on the bill’s progression in the House and Senate.</em></p>
https://www.vox.com/politics/24094839/tiktok-ban-bill-congress-pass-bidenNicole Narea2023-05-23T16:04:44-04:002023-05-23T16:04:44-04:00Montana’s TikTok ban — and the legal challenge of it — explained
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<img alt="In this photo illustration, a woman’s silhouette holds a smartphone with the TikTok logo in the background." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/0MtQ97YY5e_FsPjZ0NYv0j6KddU=/278x0:4723x3334/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/72292583/1250852492.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>Rafael Henrique/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>TikTok is now suing the state over its new policy. </p> <p id="VMkcOH"><a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/3/2/23622149/tiktok-ban-questions">Last week, Montana</a> became the first state in the United States to <a href="https://www.vox.com/2023/3/23/23653325/tiktok-ban-us-china-congress" data-source="encore">ban TikTok</a>, amid concerns lawmakers have raised over the Chinese government’s potential ability to access the app’s data. </p>
<p id="0oaZH9">The move — which comes as the federal government and other states have vocalized <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2022/12/20/23518973/tiktok-for-you-algorithm-omnibus-bill-ban">national security worries about the app</a> — goes much further than existing <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy" data-source="encore">policies</a> to restrict access to the social media platform. The ban has also faced questions regarding enforcement, and has <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/tiktok-lawsuit-montana-download-ban-rcna85332">been legally challenged by TikTok</a> on the grounds that it violates users’ and the <a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/23820566-tiktok-v-montana">company’s First Amendment rights</a>. </p>
<p id="6GYlbB"><a href="https://leg.mt.gov/bills/2023/billhtml/SB0419.htm">The law</a>, which is slated to go into effect on January 1, 2024, focuses on penalizing <a href="https://www.vox.com/tiktok" data-source="encore">TikTok</a> as well as app stores that allow users to download the product. If TikTok continues to operate in Montana, it will be fined $10,000 for a user’s initial attempt to access the app, and $10,000 a day for every day it continues to allow that user access. The same goes for <a href="https://www.vox.com/google" data-source="encore">Google</a> and <a href="https://www.vox.com/apple" data-source="encore">Apple</a>: If they allow users to download TikTok in Montana via their app stores, they will have to pay similar penalties. Individual users are not penalized for accessing the app under this law. </p>
<aside id="0Kjj9z"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"9 questions about the attempts to ban TikTok, answered ","url":"https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/3/2/23622149/tiktok-ban-questions"}]}'></div></aside><div class="c-float-right"><div id="DAdymG"><div data-anthem-component="aside:11900490"></div></div></div>
<p id="fy3u3w">The Montana law is the latest indication of US lawmakers’ growing hostility toward the app, which is owned by the <a href="https://www.vox.com/china" data-source="encore">China</a>-based company, ByteDance. The new policy follows federal and state <a href="https://apnews.com/article/why-is-tiktok-being-banned-7d2de01d3ac5ab2b8ec2239dc7f2b20d#:~:text=Congress%2C%20the%20White%20House%2C%20U.S.,and%20misinformation%20on%20its%20behalf.">bans on the use of the app on government phones</a> due to national security concerns and fears that the Chinese government is using the app to surveil users or distribute misinformation. <a href="https://news.mt.gov/Governors-Office/Governor_Gianforte_Bans_TikTok_in_Montana">Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte</a> has said he signed the law to “protect Montanans’ personal and private data from the Chinese Communist Party.” Some lawmakers have also pointed to <a href="https://apnews.com/article/tiktok-ban-china-biden-bytedance-data-misinformation-02b59e4a6611ce97c775da19de31d7ad">a 2017 Chinese law</a> that requires the country’s companies to respond to government demands for data related to national security as a reason to limit Americans’ access to the app. </p>
<p id="q6VzRF"><a href="https://apnews.com/article/tiktok-ban-china-biden-bytedance-data-misinformation-02b59e4a6611ce97c775da19de31d7ad">TikTok has pushed back against these critiques</a>, claiming that the Chinese government has not asked the company to hand over data and that it wouldn’t comply even if that did happen. <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/17/tech/montana-governor-tiktok/index.html">CNN reported</a> that “there is so far no evidence that the Chinese government has ever accessed personal information of US-based TikTok users.” <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/tiktok-is-as-dangerous-as-any-social-media-app-211526495.html#:~:text=In%20fact%2C%20according%20to%20a,kind%20of%20data%20as%20Facebook.&text=That%20information%20includes%20things%20like,other%20social%20media%20apps%20collect.">And a 2023 Georgia Institute of Technology report</a> found that <a href="https://www.internetgovernance.org/wp-content/uploads/TikTok-and-US-national-security-3.pdf">TikTok’s data collection efforts</a> were similar to those of other social media platforms, like <a href="https://www.vox.com/facebook" data-source="encore">Facebook</a>, a finding that suggested its practices aligned with those of other tech companies. </p>
<p id="uMVxeD">The company’s statements and independent reports, however, haven’t reassured lawmakers. And fueling much of this push is the fact that <a href="https://www.vox.com/22558949/china-violence-asian-americans">anti-China sentiment</a> has grown recently in the US due to rising geopolitical tensions and intensifying economic competition. </p>
<p id="dxUG8P">At this point, it’s not clear the ban will have the effect that lawmakers intended. There are ways for users to get around it, and it’s not certain how much tech companies can do to guarantee that residents of one state aren’t able to access or download the app. Additionally, TikTok, as well as the ACLU and other civil rights groups have argued that the ban infringes on users’ free speech; there are an estimated 200,000 TikTok users in Montana and 150 million TikTok users in the US. </p>
<aside id="0ZOFAZ"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"Has TikTok made us better? Or much, much worse? ","url":"https://www.vox.com/culture/23660355/tiktok-ban-cultural-impact"}]}'></div></aside><p id="9myihu">“With this ban, [lawmakers] have trampled on the free speech of hundreds of thousands of Montanans who use the app to express themselves, gather information, and run their small business in the name of anti-Chinese sentiment,” Keegan Medrano, a policy director at the ACLU of Montana, said in a statement. </p>
<h3 id="tK5QOt">The actual impact of the ban is uncertain </h3>
<p id="pcEUEY">There are outstanding enforcement and legal questions about whether the ban can be implemented effectively or whether it can exist at all. </p>
<p id="pY0qTo">As written, the law puts the onus on TikTok, as well as on app stores run by Apple and Google, to make sure that Montana users don’t download or access the app. Cybersecurity experts told <a href="https://apnews.com/article/tiktok-ban-montana-china-data-chinese-government-71143a3a87c9a0b692d927f72b6fec70">the Associated Press</a> that it could be tough for app stores to restrict users in a specific state from downloading the app. They noted that there would also be many ways for users to evade these restrictions — including by using a virtual private network, or VPN, that would allow them to mask their IP address and therefore their location. </p>
<p id="cGFeUB">Additionally, the ban is now being challenged in court. A number of groups and legal experts have echoed the ACLU’s claim that a ban could be viewed as a restriction on people’s ability to exercise free speech via the app. There’s some precedent for that argument preserving access to a foreign-owned app: <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/09/20/wechat-ban-blocked-trump/">In 2020</a>, a federal court stopped the <a href="https://www.vox.com/trump-administration" data-source="encore">Trump administration</a>’s ban of the messaging app WeChat, which is owned by Chinese multimedia company Tencent, after users said it would violate their free speech rights. That same year, a federal court blocked the <a href="https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-courts-a526c144fad9f0ebc37bf2d49a97740a">Trump administration’s attempt to ban TikTok</a> by arguing that it overstepped the scope of presidential powers. </p>
<p id="coVFBR">“Montanans are indisputably exercising their First Amendment rights when they post and consume content on TikTok,” Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/montana-bans-tiktok/">told CBS News</a>. “Because Montana can’t establish that the ban is necessary or tailored to any legitimate interest, the law is almost certain to be struck down as unconstitutional.” Since the ban won’t go into effect until January, it’s possible a judge could block it from ever coming to fruition.</p>
<p id="ioVhGr">TikTok’s lawsuit against Montana cites this argument and also suggests that the state proposal is preempted by federal law that governs issues like national security. Additionally, it states that the ban is a violation of the Constitution’s commerce clause because it would place a burden on “interstate commerce” and interferes with the app’s availability across states. </p>
<p id="STD8QH">“We are challenging Montana’s unconstitutional TikTok ban to protect our business and the hundreds of thousands of TikTok users in Montana,” TikTok spokesperson Brooke Oberwetter said in a statement. “We believe our legal challenge will prevail based on an exceedingly strong set of precedents and facts.”</p>
<p id="dkkz3T">Ultimately, Montana’s ban may prove to be a test case. The way the law is implemented — and considered by the courts — could determine how other states, and even the federal government, approach additional limitations on TikTok moving forward. </p>
<p id="6SvYdF"><em><strong>Update, May 23, 4 pm ET:</strong></em> This story was originally published on May 18 and has been updated to include the lawsuit TikTok has filed against the Montana ban. </p>
https://www.vox.com/politics/2023/5/18/23728598/montana-tiktok-ban-bytedance-china-enforcementLi Zhou2023-05-23T09:50:19-04:002023-05-23T09:50:19-04:009 questions about the attempts to ban TikTok, answered
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<img alt="A supporter holds up a sign that read “Keep TikTok” during a news conference on TikTok in front of the U.S. Capitol on March 22, 2023." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/eTmqVUnCL_Mgu6ynS2139k4TDNA=/0x0:5132x3849/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/72030715/1475397448.14.jpg" />
<figcaption>A supporter holds up a sign that read “Keep TikTok” during a news conference on TikTok in front of the US Capitol on March 22, 2023. | Alex Wong/Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>So you heard TikTok’s being banned. Here’s what’s actually happening. </p> <p id="xMSf3m">Since its introduction to the US in 2018, <a href="https://www.vox.com/tiktok" data-source="encore">TikTok</a> has been fighting for its right to exist. First, the company struggled to convince the public that it wasn’t just for <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/12/10/18129126/tiktok-app-musically-meme-cringe">preteens making cringey memes</a>; then it had to make the case that it wasn’t responsible for the platform’s <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2020/1/22/21069469/tiktok-memes-funny-ww3-politics-impeachment-fires">rampant misinformation</a> (or <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2020/2/4/21112444/renegade-tiktok-song-dance">cultural appropriation</a> … or <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/14/business/tiktok-safety-teens-eating-disorders-self-harm.html">pro-anorexia content</a> … or <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-11-30/is-tiktok-responsible-if-kids-die-doing-dangerous-viral-challenges">potentially deadly trends</a> … or <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2022/10/26/23423257/tiktok-for-you-page-algorithm">general creepiness</a>, etc). But mostly, and especially over the past three years, TikTok has been <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/1/17/23552716/tiktok-ban-cfius-bytedance">fighting against increased scrutiny</a> from US lawmakers about its ties to the Chinese government via its <a href="https://www.vox.com/china" data-source="encore">China</a>-based parent company, ByteDance.</p>
<p id="G0PY7i">Montana became the first state to <a href="https://www.vox.com/2023/3/23/23653325/tiktok-ban-us-china-congress" data-source="encore">ban TikTok</a> outright on May 17, when its governor, Greg Gianforte, signed <a href="https://www.vox.com/politics/2023/5/18/23728598/montana-tiktok-ban-bytedance-china-enforcement">the bill into law</a>. The legislation doesn’t make it illegal to use TikTok. Rather, it fines platforms that distribute it, like <a href="https://www.vox.com/apple" data-source="encore">Apple</a>’s and <a href="https://www.vox.com/google" data-source="encore">Google</a>’s app stores. The Montana law goes into effect at the beginning of 2024, assuming it survives the inevitable court challenges. At least one of those will come from TikTok, which <a href="https://www.npr.org/2023/05/22/1177541355/tiktok-sues-lawsuit-montana-law-ban">sued the state</a> days after the law was signed.</p>
<p id="33sVB9">“Today, Montana takes the most decisive action of any state to protect Montanans’ private data and sensitive personal information from being harvested by the Chinese Communist Party,” the governor <a href="https://news.mt.gov/Governors-Office/Governor_Gianforte_Bans_TikTok_in_Montana">said in a statement</a>. </p>
<p id="XUaZqJ">Until now, most of the scrutiny around TikTok resulted in <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2022/12/20/23518973/tiktok-for-you-algorithm-omnibus-bill-ban">partial bans</a> on government-owned devices in the federal and the majority of state governments. Several bills have been introduced that would ban TikTok outright, but it was never a sure thing that they’d get past the courts even if they did manage to pass. The first statewide ban may also be our first test of that.</p>
<div class="c-float-right"><div id="0oCVxe"><div data-anthem-component="aside:11900490"></div></div></div>
<p id="Tn1Aqs">“Governor Gianforte has signed a bill that infringes on the First Amendment rights of the people of Montana by unlawfully banning TikTok,” Brooke Oberwetter, a spokesperson for the app, said in a statement. </p>
<p id="YR26zE">Meanwhile, there are still threats to TikTok on the federal level. In March, a bipartisan group of 12 senators unveiled what might be <a href="https://www.vox.com/technology/2023/3/7/23628147/tiktok-restrict-act-bill-warner-thune">the biggest threat to TikTok yet</a>: a bill that would lay the groundwork for the president to ban the app. But that bill has been <a href="https://www.axios.com/pro/tech-policy/2023/04/17/restrict-act-hits-speed-bumps">mired in controversy</a>, with some pointing out that vague wording could lead to TikTok users facing fines and jail time for using things like VPNs to try to get around the ban.</p>
<p id="VTcGf8">Meanwhile, a government interagency committee that has been investigating TikTok for years <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/15/technology/tiktok-biden-pushes-sale.html">appears to be on the cusp</a> of ordering ByteDance to divest, or sell off, the app. That would take the potential Chinese threat out of the equation entirely — but only if ByteDance and China agree to it. As reports about a possible forced divestiture swirled, TikTok’s CEO, Shou Zi Chew, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/tiktok-ceos-message-to-washington-a-sale-wont-solve-security-concerns-94a8606">told the Wall Street Journal</a> that he thinks the company’s efforts to wall off the app’s US user data and recommendation algorithms from Chinese interference are more than enough to satisfy any <a href="https://www.vox.com/defense-and-security" data-source="encore">national security</a> concerns. </p>
<aside id="YN4trb"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"Is TikTok too big to ban?","url":"https://www.vox.com/technology/2023/3/21/23645362/tiktok-shou-zi-chew-congress-ban"}]}'></div></aside><p id="eBMdmU">But banning TikTok isn’t as simple as flipping a switch and deleting the app from every American’s phone, even if this new bill does pass. It’s a <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2022/12/20/23518973/tiktok-for-you-algorithm-omnibus-bill-ban">complex knot of technical and political decisions</a> that could have consequences for US-China relations, for the cottage industry of <a href="https://www.vox.com/influencers" data-source="encore">influencers</a> that has blossomed over the past five years, and for culture at large. The whole thing could also be overblown. </p>
<p id="DecRJE">The thing is, nobody really knows if a nationwide TikTok ban, however broad or all-encompassing, will even happen or how it would work if it did. It’s been three years since the US government has seriously begun considering the possibility, but the future remains just as murky as ever. Here’s what we know so far. </p>
<h3 id="pgTBoU">1) Do politicians even use TikTok? Do they know how it works or what they’re trying to ban?</h3>
<p id="kJ5xdc">Among the challenges lawmakers face in trying to ban TikTok outright is a public relations problem. Americans already think their government leaders are too old, ill-equipped to deal with modern tech, and generally out of touch. A kind of tradition has even emerged whenever <a href="https://www.vox.com/congress" data-source="encore">Congress</a> tries to do oversight of <a href="https://www.vox.com/big-tech" data-source="encore">Big Tech</a>: A committee will convene a hearing, tech CEOs will show up, and then lawmakers will <a href="https://slate.com/technology/2018/04/the-senate-fought-mark-zuckerberg-and-mark-zuckerberg-won.html">make fools</a> of <a href="https://mashable.com/article/biggest-moments-from-big-tech-anti-trust-hearing">themselves</a> by <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2018/12/12/18136956/google-hearing-sundar-pichai-congress-bias">asking questions</a> that <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/4/10/17222062/mark-zuckerberg-testimony-graham-facebook-regulations">reveal how little they know</a> about the platforms they’re trying to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/11/business/congress-tech-regulation.html">rein in</a>.</p>
<p id="AJnCL0">Congress has never heard from Chew, TikTok’s CEO, in a public committee hearing before, but representatives will get their chance <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2023/1/30/23577870/tiktok-ceo-testify-congress-bytedance-energy-commerce-shou-zi-chew">on March 23</a>. Unlike with many of the American social <a href="https://www.vox.com/media" data-source="encore">media companies</a> they’ve scrutinized before, few members of Congress have extensive experience with TikTok. Few use it for campaign purposes, and even fewer use it for official purposes. Though at least a few dozen members have some kind of account, most don’t have big followings. There are some notable exceptions: Sen. <a href="https://www.vox.com/bernie-sanders" data-source="encore">Bernie Sanders</a> (I-VT), and <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/23581198/tiktok-ban-campaign-politics-jeff-jackson-katie-porter">Reps. Katie Porter (D-CA), Jeff Jackson (D-NC)</a>, and Ilhan Omar (D-MN) use it frequently for official and campaign reasons and have big followings, while Sens. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) and Ed Markey (D-MA) are inactive on it after using it extensively during their campaigns in 2020 and 2021.</p>
<p id="E11Yp3">One vocal TikTok defender <em>has</em> emerged on the Democratic side: Rep. Jamaal Bowman of New York organized a press briefing with dozens of TikTok creators on Capitol Hill Wednesday ahead of the congressional grilling of TikTok’s CEO. Bowman, who uses TikTok frequently, called the consensus to try to restrict TikTok part of an anti-China “hysteria.” <em>—Christian Paz</em></p>
<h3 id="aMr9qx">2) Who is behind these efforts? Who is trying to ban TikTok or trying to impose restrictions?</h3>
<p id="3RLwzR">While TikTok doesn’t have vocal defenders in Congress, it does have a long list of vocal antagonists from across the country, who span party and ideological lines in both the Senate and the House.</p>
<p id="vYPGHA">The leading Republicans hoping to ban TikTok are Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Josh Hawley of Missouri, and Rep. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin, who is the new chair of the House select committee on competition with China. All three have introduced some kind of legislation attempting to ban the app or force its parent company ByteDance to sell the platform to an American company. Many more Republicans in both chambers who are critics of China, like Sen. <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/video/6316387301112">Tom Cotton of Arkansas</a> and Ted Cruz of Texas, endorse some kind of tougher restriction on the app.</p>
<p id="e3rK62">Sen. Angus King (I-ME) has also <a href="https://www.rubio.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2023/2/momentum-grows-to-ban-chinese-owned-tiktok-as-rubio-and-king-reintroduce-bipartisan-bill">joined Rubio</a> in introducing legislation that would ban the app.</p>
<aside id="pHXg47"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"Good luck explaining a TikTok ban to young people","url":"https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/23523287/tiktok-ban-young-people-gen-z-campaign-outreach"}]}'></div></aside><p id="VQ820P">Most, but not all, Democrats have been <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/tiktok-ban-lawmakers-skeptical-congress-2023-2?_gl=1*1kqhusz*_ga*OTExODIwODUyLjE2NzU3MDAxODg.*_ga_E21CV80ZCZ*MTY3NzYyNTg1Ni40LjEuMTY3NzYyNTg4Mi4wLjAuMA..">reluctant</a> to support a ban, saying they would prefer a broader approach. In the House, Gallagher’s Democratic counterpart, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois, has also called for a <a href="https://krishnamoorthi.house.gov/media/press-releases/congressman-krishnamoorthi-hails-ban-tiktok-government-devices-step-forward">ban or tougher restrictions</a>, though he <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/sunday-talk-shows/3874777-top-democrat-on-china-panel-says-he-doesnt-think-tiktok-will-be-banned/">doesn’t think a ban will happen this year</a>.</p>
<p id="Gx6O9e">Meanwhile, a bipartisan group of senators is offering a different option with the <a href="https://www.vox.com/technology/2023/3/7/23628147/tiktok-restrict-act-bill-warner-thune">recently introduced</a> Restricting the Emergence of Security Threats that Risk Information and Communications Technology (RESTRICT) Act. Led by Sens. Mark Warner (D-VA) and John Thune (R-SD), it isn’t an outright TikTok ban. Instead, it gives the government the authority to mitigate national security threats posed by technologies from hostile countries, up to a ban. TikTok would be subject to this bill. Warner, who runs the Senate Intelligence Committee, is perhaps the <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/23453786/tiktok-bytedance-cfius-data-trump-ban">most vocal Democrat</a> on the perceived dangers of TikTok, but had held off on signing on to a bill that would ban it specifically.</p>
<p id="H9VQ3S">The majority of states in the US have banned TikTok on state government devices. Republican-controlled Montana became the first to ban the app entirely, but it’s very much an open question as to whether that law will be allowed to happen. It has been criticized as an <a href="https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/aclu-slams-montanas-unconstitutional-tiktok-ban-as-governor-signs-law">infringement on free speech</a> and <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2023/04/montana-bill-bans-tiktok/673774/">difficult if not impossible</a> for app stores to abide by due to technical constraints.</p>
<p id="H4VwiG"> <em>—CP and Sara Morrison</em></p>
<h3 id="pp7PGb">3) What is the relationship between TikTok and the Chinese government? Do they have users’ info?</h3>
<p id="nZj2kW">If you ask TikTok, the company will tell you there is no relationship and that it has not and would not give US user data to the Chinese government.</p>
<p id="HIqOzv">But TikTok is owned by ByteDance, a company based in Beijing that is subject to Chinese laws. Those laws compel businesses to assist the government whenever it asks, which many believe would force ByteDance to give the Chinese government any user data it has access to whenever it asks for it. Or it could be ordered to push certain kinds of content, like propaganda or disinformation, on American users.</p>
<p id="ULHj2N">We don’t know if this has actually happened at this point. We only know that it could, assuming ByteDance even has access to TikTok’s US user data and algorithms. TikTok has been <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/1/17/23552716/tiktok-ban-cfius-bytedance">working hard</a> to convince everyone that it has protections in place that wall off US user data from ByteDance and, by extension, the Chinese government. <em>—SM</em></p>
<h3 id="1c1YnE">4) What happens to people whose income comes from TikTok? If there is a ban, is it even possible for creators to find similar success on Reels or Shorts or other platforms? </h3>
<p id="TbJwEd">Most people who’ve counted on TikTok as their main source of revenue have long been prepared for a possible ban. Fifteen years into the influencer industry, it’s old hat that, eventually, <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/22642250/onlyfans-reverse-ban-porn-sexually-explicit-content-policy-bbc-mystery">social media platforms will betray</a> their most loyal users in one way or another. Plus, after <a href="https://www.vox.com/donald-trump" data-source="encore">President Trump</a> attempted a ban in the summer of 2020, many established TikTokers diversified their online presence by focusing more of their efforts on other platforms like <a href="https://www.vox.com/instagram-news" data-source="encore">Instagram</a> Reels or <a href="https://www.vox.com/youtube" data-source="encore">YouTube</a> Shorts.</p>
<p id="nECfI5">That doesn’t mean that losing TikTok won’t hurt influencers. No <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/10/2/20891915/tiktok-famous-teenagers-haley-sharpe-yodeling-karen">other social platform is quite as good</a> as TikTok at turning a completely unknown person or brand into a global superstar, thanks to its emphasis on discovery versus keeping people up to date on the users they already follow. Which means that without TikTok, it’ll be far more difficult for aspiring influencers to see the kind of overnight success enjoyed by OG TikTokers. </p>
<aside id="FddkAS"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"The rise of the TikTok scold ","url":"https://www.vox.com/culture/23648715/tiktok-instagram-advice-mistakes-howto-tutorial"}]}'></div></aside><p id="3GAZn7">The good news is that there’s likely more <a href="https://www.vox.com/money" data-source="encore">money</a> to be made on other platforms, specifically Instagram Reels. Creators <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/culture/rabbit-holes/the-instagram-reels-gold-rush">can sometimes make tens of thousands of dollars per month</a> from Instagram’s creator fund, which rewards users with money based on the number of views their videos get. Instagram is also viewed as a safer, more predictable platform for influencers in their dealings with brands, which can use an influencer’s previous metrics to set a fair rate for the work. (It’s a different story on TikTok, where even a post by someone with millions of followers could get buried by the algorithm, and it’s less evident that past success will continue in the future.) <em>—Rebecca Jennings</em></p>
<h3 id="VFN01z">5) What does the TikTok ban look like to me, the user? Am I going to get arrested for using TikTok?</h3>
<p id="D7AJ0J">Almost certainly not. The most likely way a ban would happen would be through an <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/08/11/2020-17699/addressing-the-threat-posed-by-tiktok-and-taking-additional-steps-to-address-the-national-emergency">executive order</a> that cites national security grounds to forbid business transactions with TikTok. Those transactions would likely be defined as services that facilitate the app’s operations and distribution. Which means you might have a much harder time finding and using TikTok, but you won’t go to jail if you do. <em>—SM</em></p>
<aside id="TXtUA7"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"TikTok isn’t really limiting kids’ time on its app","url":"https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/3/2/23620393/tiktok-screen-time-limit-parents-ban"}]}'></div></aside><h3 id="bdbuyW">6) How is it enforced? What does the TikTok ban look like to the App Store and other businesses? </h3>
<p id="OeTpNT">The most viable path as of now is using the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, which gives the president <a href="https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/presidents-extraordinary-sanctions-powers">broader powers</a> than he otherwise has. President Trump used this when he tried to ban TikTok in 2020, and lawmakers <a href="https://buck.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/buck-hawley-introduce-new-bill-ban-tiktok-nationwide">have</a> <a href="https://www.rubio.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2022/12/rubio-gallagher-introduce-bipartisan-legislation-to-ban-tiktok">since</a> <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/house-bill/1153?s=1&r=1&q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22Hr+1153%22%5D%7D">introduced</a> TikTok-banning bills that essentially call for the current president to try again, but this time with additional measures in place that might avoid the court battles that stalled Trump’s attempt.</p>
<p id="TzpYTP">Trump’s ban attempt does give us some guidance on what such a ban would look like, however. The <a href="https://www.vox.com/trump-administration" data-source="encore">Trump administration</a> <a href="https://www.wiley.law/alert-Commerce-Department-Identifies-Prohibited-WeChat-TikTok-Transactions">spelled out</a> some examples of banned transactions, including app stores not being allowed to carry it and internet hosting services not being allowed to host it. If you have an iPhone, it’s exceedingly difficult to get a native app on your phone that isn’t allowed in Apple’s App Store — or to get updates for that app if you downloaded it before this hypothetical ban came down. It’s also conceivable that companies would be prohibited from advertising on the app and content creators wouldn’t be able to use TikTok’s monetization tools.</p>
<p id="FI0oZe">There are considerable civil and criminal penalties for violating the IEEPA. Don’t expect Apple or Google or <a href="https://twitter.com/MrBeast/status/1484616451281588227">Mr. Beast</a> to do so.</p>
<p id="qPc4aG">The RESTRICT Act would give the president another way to ban TikTok, as it gives the Commerce Department the authority to review and investigate information and communication technology from countries deemed to be adversaries, which would include TikTok and China. The commerce secretary could then recommend to the president which actions should be taken to mitigate any national security threat these technologies pose, up to banning them. The White House supports this bill. But a lot of things would have to happen before it’s a viable option to ban TikTok. First and foremost, the bill would have to actually pass. <em>—SM</em></p>
<h3 id="nTVh23">7) On what grounds would TikTok be reinstated? Are there any changes big enough that would make it “safe” in the eyes of the US government? </h3>
<p id="XFza4h">TikTok is <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/1/17/23552716/tiktok-ban-cfius-bytedance">already trying</a> to make those changes to convince a <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/international/the-committee-on-foreign-investment-in-the-united-states-cfius">multi-agency government panel</a> that it can operate in the US without being a national security risk. If that panel, called the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States (CFIUS), can’t reach an agreement with TikTok, then it’s doubtful there’s anything more TikTok can do. CFIUS has been investigating TikTok for years now. An agreement that would allow TikTok to stay in the US seemed imminent last summer, but it was never finalized.</p>
<p id="3yd5M4">And it’s not looking very promising that it will be. Though a final decision still has not been made, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-threatens-to-ban-tiktok-if-chinese-founder-doesnt-sell-ownership-stake-36d7295c">recent</a> <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-03-15/us-demands-tiktok-s-chinese-owners-sell-stakes-or-face-ban">reports</a> say that CFIUS is pushing for ByteDance to sell off TikTok, ideally to a US-based company. The <a href="https://www.vox.com/joe-biden" data-source="encore">Biden administration</a> declined to comment. That move was <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/7/31/21350072/trump-tiktok-executive-order-ban-microsoft-sale-bytedance-china-security-concerns">considered</a> back in the Trump administration and would presumably take most (if not all) of the heat off TikTok. TikTok doesn’t think that would address the underlying issues. </p>
<p id="CtP3Gd">“A change in ownership would not impose any new restrictions on data flows or access,” spokesperson Brooke Oberwetter told Vox. “The best way to address concerns about national security is with the transparent, US-based protection of US user data and systems, with robust third-party monitoring, vetting, and verification, which we are already implementing.”</p>
<p id="vd9aSm">Even if ByteDance wanted to sell TikTok, it may not be allowed to. The Chinese government would have to approve such a sale, and it’s made it pretty clear that <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2022/bytedance-tiktok-privacy-china/">it won’t</a>. <em>—SM</em></p>
<h3 id="Jmmiew">8) Is there any kind of precedent for banning apps?</h3>
<p id="MS0qbs">China and other countries do ban US apps. The TikTok app doesn’t even exist in China. It has a domestic version, called Douyin, instead. TikTok also isn’t in <a href="https://www.vox.com/india" data-source="encore">India</a>, which banned it in 2020. So there is precedent for other countries banning apps, including TikTok. But these are different countries with different laws. That kind of censorship doesn’t really fly here. President Trump’s attempt to ban TikTok in 2020 <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2020/12/7/22160239/tiktok-ban-judge-trump-administration-us-commerce-department">wasn’t going well in the courts</a>, but we never got an ultimate decision because Trump lost the election and the Biden administration rescinded the order. </p>
<p id="s5ONQD">The closest thing we have to the TikTok debacle is probably Grindr. A Chinese company bought the gay dating app in 2018, only to be <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2019/3/27/18283666/grindr-chinese-owner-beijing-kunlun-tech-cfius-divest-national-security-concerns">forced</a> by CFIUS to sell it off the next year. <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/6/21168079/grindr-sold-chinese-owner-us-cfius-security-concerns-kunlun-lgbtq">It did</a>, thus avoiding a ban. So we don’t know how a TikTok ban would play out if it came down to it. <em>—SM</em></p>
<h3 id="T0b0ay">9) How overblown is this?</h3>
<p id="M7FQIc">At the moment, there’s no indication that the Chinese government has asked for private data of American citizens from ByteDance, or that the parent company has provided that information to Chinese government officials. But American user data has reportedly been accessed by China-based employees of ByteDance, according to a <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/emilybakerwhite/tiktok-tapes-us-user-data-china-bytedance-access">BuzzFeed News investigation</a> last year. The company has also set up <a href="https://newsroom.tiktok.com/en-us/our-approach-to-keeping-us-data-secure">protocols</a> under which employees abroad could remotely access American data. The company stresses that this is no different from how other “global companies” operate and that it is moving to funnel all US data through American servers. But the possibility of the Chinese government having access to this data at some point is fueling the national security concerns in the US. </p>
<p id="JrwIXC">This doesn’t speak to the other reasons driving government scrutiny of the app: data privacy and <a href="https://www.vox.com/mental-health" data-source="encore">mental health</a>. Some elected officials would like to see stricter rules and regulations in place limiting the kind of information that younger Americans have to give up when using TikTok and other platforms, (<a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/23581198/tiktok-ban-campaign-politics-jeff-jackson-katie-porter">like Markey, the senator from Massachusetts</a>), while others would like a closer look at <a href="https://khn.org/morning-breakout/bill-aims-to-curb-harm-of-social-media-on-the-tiktok-generation/">limits</a> on <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/sen-josh-hawley-wants-create-legal-age-social-media-rcna69045">when children can use</a> the app as part of <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/02/16/children-social-media-protection-congress/">broader regulations on Big Tech</a>. Democratic members of Congress have also <a href="https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/committee-activity/hearings/protecting-our-children-online">cited concerns</a> with how much time children are spending online, potentially detrimental effects of social media, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/11/tech/tiktok-teen-mental-health/index.html">including TikTok</a>, on children, and the greater mental health challenges younger Americans are facing today. TikTok is already making efforts to fend off this criticism: At the start of March, they announced new screen time limits for users under the age of 17. But even those <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/3/2/23620393/tiktok-screen-time-limit-parents-ban">measures are more like suggestions</a>. <em>—CP</em></p>
<p id="ZIO41V"><strong>Update, May 23, 9:50 am ET:</strong> This story was originally published on March 2 and has been updated multiple times, most recently to reflect Montana’s TikTok ban and TikTok’s lawsuit. </p>
https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/3/2/23622149/tiktok-ban-questionsSara MorrisonChristian PazRebecca Jennings2023-03-29T11:42:33-04:002023-03-29T11:42:33-04:00The RESTRICT Act is more bad news for TikTok
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<img alt="From right to left, Senators Joe Manchin, John Thune, Mark Warner, Tammy Baldwin, and Michael Bennet standing behind a lectern." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/p2Y8A9LrvJ4r4ivfkMgcoQoVGK0=/800x0:8121x5491/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/72048733/GettyImages_1247870203.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>Sen. Mark Warner announces the RESTRICT Act with some of the bill’s sponsors. | Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>Sens. Mark Warner and John Thune have a bipartisan bill to deal with TikTok and beyond.</p> <p id="YSNhGp">There might be a new way to deal with TikTok in DC: a bipartisan bill from Sens. Mark Warner (D-VA) and John Thune (R-SD) that isn’t a <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/3/2/23622149/tiktok-ban-questions">TikTok ban</a> — though it could lead to one. It also doesn’t just address TikTok or its parent company, the Chinese-based ByteDance, but all technology companies from countries that have been identified as countries of concern.</p>
<p id="pBeMpO">“Today everybody’s talking about TikTok,” Warner said in a press conference announcing the bill. “But before there was TikTok there was <a href="https://www.vox.com/technology/2018/12/11/18134440/huawei-executive-order-entity-list-china-trump">Huawei and ZTE</a>, and before that there was Russia’s <a href="https://www.reuters.com/technology/exclusive-us-warned-firms-about-russias-kaspersky-software-day-after-invasion-2022-03-31/">Kaspersky Lab</a>.” </p>
<p id="96AUse">The Restricting the Emergence of Security Threats that Risk Information and Communications Technology (RESTRICT) Act, which Warner and Thune unveiled on March 7, gives the secretary of commerce the power to take actions against technology companies that are based in certain countries determined to be “foreign adversaries,” including China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela, and Cuba. That would include banning their information and communications products and services, but the government would be allowed to declassify documents that make the case that such an extreme step is actually necessary — something that’s so far been missing from most of the arguments for a TikTok ban, which are rooted in what <em>could</em> happen and not what actually has. </p>
<p id="7l44nD">Notably, the bill is <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/3/2/23622149/tiktok-ban-questions">not the outright ban</a> that many of TikTok’s detractors have called for and other lawmakers support — at least, not yet. But it could be the most feasible legislative solution to the TikTok problem. It also deals more comprehensively with the prospect of apps from hostile countries being used against US interests, as opposed to singling one or two of them out from just one country as other TikTok ban efforts have done. The bill would give the commerce secretary authority to identify, investigate, and determine which actions should be taken against products and services that it determines to pose a national security threat. The president will then determine if those actions are necessary and order them to be carried out. </p>
<p id="J9tcsM">“Our tools to date have been relatively limited,” Warner said. “We lack a holistic, interagency, whole-of-government approach.” This bill, he said, would do just that. And it would give the government the ability to deal with future potential technological threats, such as AI.</p>
<aside id="ixFRN2"><div data-anthem-component="readmore" data-anthem-component-data='{"stories":[{"title":"9 questions about the threats to ban TikTok, answered ","url":"https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/3/2/23622149/tiktok-ban-questions"}]}'></div></aside><div class="c-float-right"><div id="2Xo7WR"><div data-anthem-component="aside:11900490"></div></div></div>
<p id="Jshc3C">The concern with TikTok is that Chinese law allows the government to order ByteDance to give it TikTok’s US user data or spread propaganda or misinformation to US users. ByteDance and TikTok have denied ever doing this, and there’s no public evidence that they have. But for TikTok’s opponents, the potential is enough. They’ve also cited past controversies over <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/sep/25/revealed-how-tiktok-censors-videos-that-do-not-please-beijing">censorship of content</a> that’s banned in China and ByteDance employees <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/emilybaker-white/2022/12/23/lawmakers-outrage-tiktok-spied-on-journalists/">accessing the location data</a> of a few US TikTok users in order to investigate employees suspected of leaking information to journalists (ByteDance said this surveillance wasn’t authorized by the company and the employees responsible were fired).</p>
<p id="uaeeX6">Since <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/7/31/21350072/trump-tiktok-executive-order-ban-microsoft-sale-bytedance-china-security-concerns">August 2020</a>, when former President Donald Trump issued an executive order calling for ByteDance to sell TikTok to an American company or be banned, TikTok has been <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/system/files/136/EO-on-TikTok-8-14-20.pdf">under review</a> by an <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/policy-issues/international/the-committee-on-foreign-investment-in-the-united-states-cfius/cfius-overview">inter-agency group</a> called the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS). Both parties have been trying to work out an agreement that would assuage national security concerns and would allow the company to continue to operate in the country. According to TikTok, the company had a draft agreement with CFIUS that was all but signed six months ago, and TikTok has for years been implementing various <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/1/17/23552716/tiktok-ban-cfius-bytedance">trust and safety</a> <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/2/2/23582202/tiktok-headquarters-press-accountability-ban-trump">measures</a> based on its provisions. That includes a partnership with Oracle to house TikTok’s US user data on Oracle’s servers in the US; a plan to give Oracle and other third parties some oversight over TikTok’s data, algorithm, and employees; and strict limits on who has access to US user data. </p>
<p id="2zJRx6">“The Biden administration does not need additional authority from Congress to address national security concerns about TikTok: It can approve the deal negotiated with CFIUS over two years that it has spent the last six months reviewing,” TikTok spokesperson Brooke Oberwetter said in a statement. “A US ban on TikTok is a ban on the export of American culture and values to the billion-plus people who use our service worldwide.”</p>
<p id="3nbY3z">Warner, who is the chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/1/17/23552716/tiktok-ban-cfius-bytedance">told Vox in January</a> that “Congress could soon be forced to step in” if the CFIUS review continued to drag on, though he also said he didn’t want to go as far as a targeted ban. Between the lack of a deal and the <a href="https://www.vox.com/politics/2023/2/17/23603158/balloons-ufos-biden-war-china-not-inevitable">escalating tensions</a> with China — including China’s friendly relationship with Russia, its use of spy balloons over the US, the bans of TikTok on federal and many state government-owned devices, and the <a href="https://www.hawley.senate.gov/hawley-buck-introduce-new-bill-ban-tiktok-us">growing</a> <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2023/03/01/house-republicans-tiktok-ban-00084951">number</a> of <a href="https://gallagher.house.gov/media/press-releases/gallagher-rubio-introduce-bipartisan-legislation-ban-tiktok">bills</a> calling for TikTok to be banned outright — it seems Warner has lost his patience.</p>
<p id="a27lrW">Joining Warner and Thune in sponsoring the bill are Sens. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Deb Fischer (R-NE), Joe Manchin (D-WV), Jerry Moran (R-KS), Michael Bennet (D-CO), Dan Sullivan (R-AK), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Susan Collins (R-ME), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), and Mitt Romney (R-UT). They stressed the bipartisan support for the bill and the need to do something more than ban just one app from one company when there are many technological threats, including both software and hardware, from several companies and countries.</p>
<p id="HkGKB8">Several more senators signed onto the bill since its introduction, including Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), Kevin Cramer (R-ND), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Chuck Grassley (R-IA), John Hickenlooper (D-CO), Tim Kaine (D-VA), Mark Kelly (D-AZ), Ben Ray Lujan (D-NM), and Thom Tillis (R-NC).</p>
<p id="DYfJFS">The Biden administration also seems to have lost its patience. It appears that CFIUS deal will never be finalized, as the Biden administration is now <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-threatens-to-ban-tiktok-if-chinese-founder-doesnt-sell-ownership-stake-36d7295c">reportedly</a> demanding that ByteDance sells off TikTok. But ByteDance would need the Chinese government’s approval to do so, and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/24/tech/china-opposes-tiktok-sale-approval-needed-intl-hnk/index.html">China said</a> it wouldn’t grant it.</p>
<p id="7CZtrg">National security adviser Jake Sullivan signaled the White House’s support for the RESTRICT Act shortly after its introduction, saying in a statement that the bill “will help us address the threats we face today, and also prevent such risks from arising in the future.”</p>
<p id="6HZoQl">“We look forward to continue working with both Democrats and Republicans on this bill, and urge Congress to act quickly to send it to the president’s desk,” Sullivan added.</p>
<p id="tcEJrr">Despite all of this, it’s still unlikely TikTok will actually be banned in the US. Such a move would be all but unprecedented here, and the legality of it has yet to be tested aside from Trump’s efforts, which were dropped when the Biden administration took over and rescinded his order. TikTok bans have largely been a Republican affair (Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, who <a href="https://www.courier-journal.com/story/opinion/2023/03/29/rand-paul-does-the-us-really-want-to-emulate-china-by-banning-tiktok/70056172007/">said</a> he is against a ban because it would harm free speech, is the exception), with only a few Democrats registering their support of them and many saying they <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-house-democrat-opposes-giving-biden-power-ban-tiktok-2023-02-28/">oppose them</a>. Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) even held an <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/22/nyregion/jamaal-bowman-tiktok.html">anti-ban rally</a>.</p>
<p id="VCvJ9Q">But that may be changing, too. TikTok CEO Shou Chew <a href="https://www.vox.com/technology/23653884/tiktok-hearing-shou-chew-winners-losers">endured</a> a hours-long grilling from the House Energy and Commerce Committee on March 23 that was very much a bipartisan effort, something several lawmakers noted during the proceedings.</p>
<p id="oijCv8">Outside of congressional action, Republican FCC commissioner <a href="https://www.fcc.gov/sites/default/files/carr-letter-apple-and-google.pdf">Brendan Carr</a> and Sen. <a href="https://www.bennet.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2023/2/bennet-urges-apple-google-to-remove-tiktok-from-app-stores">Bennet</a> have both asked Apple and Google to remove the app from their app stores. These are requests, not orders, and there’s no indication that the companies would accede to them. But it would take the onus off lawmakers to have to do anything.</p>
<p id="TBlrkI">In the end, a ban’s biggest obstacle may not be politics but what it would actually do. It would mean taking a beloved platform away from the estimated more than 150 million Americans who use it as well as the many businesses that are turning to the platform to advertise their goods and services. That wouldn’t go over well with them, to say the least. And, contrary to popular belief that it is just an app for kids, many TikTok users are of voting age. While TikTok is banned in a few other countries (India, most notably; it’s also not available in China, which has its own version, called Douyin), it could also have a <a href="https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2023/03/tiktok-ban-would-make-for-very-strange-day-on-the-internet.html">profound impact on the rest of the internet</a> if it’s banned in the US. This is an extreme and likely unpopular move that is nowhere near being implemented. But it seems to be a little closer than it was a few years or even months ago.</p>
<p id="IZ786o">Many Republicans have said that they won’t accept anything less than an outright ban at this point, so the RESTRICT Act, though bipartisan, still has an uphill battle. But it may be the happy medium that enough lawmakers are looking for to at least do something about TikTok without having to go as far as banning it — while still leaving that as an option. And that might be good enough.</p>
<p id="WzglPz">“I do think we’re gonna pass this,” Bennet, the Colorado senator, said.</p>
<p id="6FpVnq"><em><strong>Update, March 29, 11:30 am ET: </strong></em><em>This story, originally published March 7, has been updated to include new statements from lawmakers and officials, news of Chew’s hearing, and the US and Chinese governments’ positions on a possible sale.</em></p>
https://www.vox.com/technology/2023/3/7/23628147/tiktok-ban-restrict-act-bill-warner-thuneSara Morrison2023-03-29T09:00:00-04:002023-03-29T09:00:00-04:00Has TikTok made us better? Or much, much worse?
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<img alt="A person’s hands hold a smartphone with the TikTok app open on it. In the background, two other people are looking at their phones." src="https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/lyiSXN2er6eI5_Yn_KXZyOWWClw=/57x0:968x683/1310x983/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/72126423/GettyImages_1223641022.0.jpg" />
<figcaption>AFP via Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>The case for and against TikTok as a cultural force. </p> <p id="TZLjEV">You’ve likely heard that the <a href="https://www.vox.com/recode/2023/3/2/23622149/tiktok-ban-questions">US government is trying to ban TikTok</a>. Lawmakers want to force TikTok to divest from its China-based parent company, ByteDance, and become a fully US-based company; if that doesn’t work (the Chinese government has <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-says-it-opposes-a-forced-sale-of-tiktok-1a2ffc62">said it would oppose this</a>), a ban could come in the form of an executive order forbidding business transactions with TikTok, i.e., prohibiting it from the Apple and Android app stores. </p>
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<p id="hVWB7X">The government’s ostensible reasoning for all of this complicated, confusing, and <a href="https://www.vox.com/technology/23653884/tiktok-hearing-shou-chew-winners-losers">extremely showboat-y</a> hubbub, which included <a href="https://www.vox.com/technology/23653884/tiktok-hearing-shou-chew-winners-losers">last week’s hearing with TikTok CEO Shou Chew</a>, is national security. A large and bipartisan swath of Congress is concerned that because ByteDance is based in China, the Chinese government could access American users’ data and push or suppress certain kinds of content to Americans. Judging by many of the questions asked by congresspeople (one <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/25/tech/tiktok-user-reaction-hearing/index.html">wondered if</a> TikTok had access to his “home WiFi network”), officials barely seem to grasp what TikTok is, framing it as either single-handedly responsible for all the mischief kids get up to online or as a Chinese psy-op. </p>
<p id="WBr4JB">While these concerns are not exactly throwaways, they don’t address the more existential question of TikTok’s five-year presence on Americans’ phones (more than 150 million of them!): Is TikTok a force for good? What even is “good” on the internet? Can a social platform ever aspire to be it, much less embody it?</p>
<p id="JJ6Wrw">TikTok is inherently different from Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, BeReal (at least the people <a href="https://www.businessofapps.com/news/bereal-users-decline-from-october-peak/">still using it</a>), or any of the other social apps begging for our attention. What do we lose if we lose TikTok? I’m not talking so much about the people whose livelihoods are tied up in it — those people will surely lose business and clout, but many of them will or already have pivoted to other platforms. I’m talking more about the things you can’t quantify: the explosion of creativity you’ll see in just a few scrolls spent on TikTok, the bringing together of hundreds of cultures, the ways in which TikTok does and doesn’t act as a democratizing force. Have we been asking the wrong questions about TikTok the whole time? Whether or not you’re being spied on, is it an app even worth using at all? Here, the cases for and against TikTok. </p>
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<h3 id="ix29is">TikTok is good, actually</h3>
<p id="w3TGBf">When TikTok came on the scene in 2018, the only thing most people knew about it was that <a href="https://www.vox.com/culture/2018/12/10/18129126/tiktok-app-musically-meme-cringe">it was embarrassing</a>. Having evolved from <a href="https://www.vulture.com/article/musically-transitions-baby-ariel.html">the platform Musical.ly</a>, which was populated largely by children and young teenagers lip-syncing to sped-up versions of pop hits, TikTok took a few months to shed the stench of cringe content. Slowly, however (and then much more quickly at the onset of the pandemic), more people were charmed by its unique video editing tools, the easy-to-replicate meme formats, and a new, burgeoning form of extremely silly comedy. In the depths of quarantine, TikTok <a href="https://reallifemag.com/take-me-away/">offered an escape</a>, whether it was in the form of scrolling through <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2020/8/3/21349640/cottagecore-taylor-swift-folklore-lesbian-clothes-animal-crossing">cutesy cottagecore content</a> or <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/14/style/tiktok-parents.html">families learning dance moves</a> while stuck at home together. </p>
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<blockquote class="tiktok-embed" cite="https://www.tiktok.com/@jesca.her/video/7003050289838198021" data-video-id="7003050289838198021" data-embed-from="oembed" style="max-width: 605px;min-width: 325px;"> <section> <a target="_blank" title="@jesca.her" href="https://www.tiktok.com/@jesca.her?refer=embed">@jesca.her</a> <p>Soft and fluffy honey butter rolls <a title="fall" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/fall?refer=embed">#fall</a> <a title="september" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/september?refer=embed">#september</a> <a title="recipes" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/recipes?refer=embed">#recipes</a> <a title="cottagecore" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/cottagecore?refer=embed">#cottagecore</a> <a title="baking" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/baking?refer=embed">#baking</a> <a title="fallvibes" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/fallvibes?refer=embed">#fallvibes</a></p> <a target="_blank" title="♬ Twilight - Spencer Hunt" href="https://www.tiktok.com/music/Twilight-6760259641810094082?refer=embed">♬ Twilight - Spencer Hunt</a> </section> </blockquote> <script async="" src="https://www.tiktok.com/embed.js"></script>
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<p id="VBuSyL">The experience of using TikTok sets it apart from its competitors. As addicting as TikTok is, it does not beckon you with constant notifications the way Facebook and Instagram seem to constantly demand your attention, and when you spend more than an hour scrolling, TikTok will encourage you to take a break. </p>
<p id="g1ivzg">Even pre-pandemic, it was clear that TikTok was an extraordinarily powerful communication tool. First, it’s succinct: Until recently, all TikTok videos were capped at three minutes (the limit was originally 60 seconds). Second, you can go viral even if you don’t have any followers: Videos are served algorithmically to each user based on what they’ve engaged with in the past, and even videos from small accounts can pick up steam on people’s For You pages via a snowball effect. Third: Most of the time, you see the person’s face as they’re talking, creating a stronger, more familiar bond than if you’d simply read a tweet or listened to a podcast. Instead of feeling like you’re watching a stranger, when you see a person talking to you for long enough, they start to feel like someone you can trust. </p>
<p id="cqauPu">While much of the attention on TikTok’s ability to make strangers feel like friends has focused on how it has hastened the spread of harmful misinformation, it has also encouraged young people to <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/30/politics/tik-tok-get-out-the-vote/index.html">vote</a>, to <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2020/1/22/21069469/tiktok-memes-funny-ww3-politics-impeachment-fires">engage in local politics</a>, and to <a href="https://www.thecut.com/2019/08/tiktok-teachers-strike-ccsd-nevada.html">organize</a> — sometimes <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/pop-culture/pop-culture-news/months-after-tiktok-apologized-black-creators-many-say-little-has-n1256726">against TikTok itself</a>. It has helped some teens <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/11/14/20963125/tiktok-ugly-hi-im-ryan">embrace their own mediocrity</a> on an internet that nearly always serves them people who are prettier, richer, and more talented than they are. It has inspired people to make <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2020/4/7/21207127/things-to-do-during-quarantine-dalgona-coffee-bread-baking-trends">fun iced coffee drinks</a>, to pursue careers in <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/10/2/20891915/tiktok-famous-teenagers-haley-sharpe-yodeling-karen">arts and entertainment</a>, to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/11/well/mind/romanticize-your-life-tiktok.html">romanticize their lives</a>, to feel more <a href="https://www.thecut.com/2023/02/i-never-asked-to-be-the-face-of-a-movement.html">positively about their own bodies</a>. It’s been a source of joy for people <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/health-wellness/2021/09/27/terminal-illness-tiktok-helps-demystify-death-dying-and-hospice/5871295001/">dying of terminal disease</a>, an <a href="https://mashable.com/article/grief-on-tiktok">outlet for the grieving</a>, a haven for <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/22606245/tiktok-queer-fluid-bisexuality-nonbinary-filter">queer and questioning kids</a>, a diary for <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/trans-tiktok-dylan-mulvaney-365-days-girlhood-1234695627/">newly out trans people</a>. </p>
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<blockquote class="tiktok-embed" cite="https://www.tiktok.com/@dylanmulvaney/video/7193364487171444014" data-video-id="7193364487171444014" data-embed-from="oembed" style="max-width: 605px;min-width: 325px;"> <section> <a target="_blank" title="@dylanmulvaney" href="https://www.tiktok.com/@dylanmulvaney?refer=embed">@dylanmulvaney</a> <p>FACIAL FEMINIZATION REVEAL ✔️ <a title="trans" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/trans?refer=embed">#trans</a> <a title="ffs" target="_blank" href="https://www.tiktok.com/tag/ffs?refer=embed">#ffs</a> </p> <a target="_blank" title="♬ original sound - Dylan Mulvaney" href="https://www.tiktok.com/music/original-sound-7193364502740519723?refer=embed">♬ original sound - Dylan Mulvaney</a> </section> </blockquote> <script async="" src="https://www.tiktok.com/embed.js"></script>
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<p id="7C8RaP">In a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/12/27/opinion/sunday/twitter-social-media.html">2019 op-ed defending</a> Twitter’s effect on culture, Sarah J. Jackson argues that despite its reputation of being a cesspit, the social app actually made us better people. The same argument can be made for TikTok. “Like all technological tools, Twitter can be exploited for evil and harnessed for good,” she writes. “Just as the printing press was used to publish content that argued fervently for slavery, it was also used by abolitionists to make the case for manumission. Just as radio and television were used to stir up the fervor of McCarthyism, they were also used to undermine it. Twitter has fallen short in many ways. But this decade, it helped ordinary people change our world.” TikTok is, at its best, a champion for ordinary people, for democracy, for debate, for discourse. That doesn’t mean it’s always nice, but it can be. </p>
<h3 id="GbiJdG">TikTok is bad, actually</h3>
<p id="rghsZm">Or maybe it’s all shitty, and we’re simply too addicted to scrolling through TikTok to notice or care how much it’s harming us. At least 15 children under 13 who tried to participate in its viral “blackout challenge” <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-11-30/is-tiktok-responsible-if-kids-die-doing-dangerous-viral-challenges">have died</a>. While pursuing the dream that TikTok dangled in front of them — becoming an overnight superstar — many more have become <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2021/5/25/22451987/influencer-burnout-tiktok-clubhouse">burnt out</a>, <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2020/2/27/21153364/tiktok-famous-backlash">disillusioned</a>, or <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11700887/American-TikTokker-dies-stumbling-70ft-coastal-cliff-Puerto-Rico-shooting-videos.html">otherwise hurt</a>. “Dance used to be the most fun thing in my life and now I don’t like it. Social media has robbed me of that,” says <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/22672582/charli-damelio-show-hulu-dixie">TikTok’s biggest breakout star, Charli D’Amelio</a>, in the first season of her reality show. “I don’t know how long anyone expects me to keep going as if nothing is wrong.”</p>
<p id="UPQAYJ">Watch enough TikTok and you’ll start to see an extremely skewed version of the world, one where only the loudest, most extreme version of humanity is the kind worth noticing. On TikTok, it’s easy to get the sense that everyone is either beautiful or hideous, talented or cringe, billionaires or destitute, simply because extremes are what gets the most attention. As an <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2021/5/18/22440937/tiktok-addison-rae-bella-poarch-build-a-bitch-charli-damelio-mediocrity">algorithmically driven platform, TikTok rewards its users’ basest instincts</a>. What hits on TikTok is a legible, irresistible hook — or, in other words, the kind of content that smacks you in the face with its obviousness. </p>
<p id="ajIIAE">One largely inconsequential example: At several points over the past three years, we’ve been told that <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2021/2/16/22280755/tiktok-gen-z-millennials-skinny-jeans-side-part">millennials are at war with Gen Z</a>. Despite the fact that a handful of viral TikToks hardly count as a “war,” the way TikTok amplifies meaningless controversy through algorithmic power and negativity bias is concerning, not just because young people desperately need solidarity to create a better world for all of us, but because these sorts of <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/22841564/internet-trends-tiktok-sea-shanties-bama-rush">mostly made-up trends</a> offer a distorted view of what the world’s actual immediate problems are. A far more consequential example: <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/04/19/libs-of-tiktok-right-wing-media/">Accounts like @LibsofTikTok</a>, which cherry-pick content from liberal or queer TikTokers and use them as strawmen for the left for their followers to mock and attack, function as rage-bait fueling the right-wing media. In the same way that <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/23497207/chronically-online-twitter-tiktok">“chronically online” discourse on Twitter</a> distracts us with culture war kindling, TikTok makes it even more personal and ad hominem. </p>
<p id="TkbwsU">TikTok videos’ brevity only adds to this problem; the short, headline-grabbing content that goes the most viral is largely devoid of context and nuance, seemingly designed to distract and anger us further. Even something as simple as, say, a review of a new skin care product, is often framed in hyperbole — <a href="https://www.vox.com/the-goods/22555723/tiktok-viral-products-cerave-sky-high-mascara-amazon-leggings">videos don’t travel unless you make it sound like</a> “this is the BEST thing I’ve ever tried,” or its inverse: “All the videos encouraging you to buy this product are LIES!” What’s left is a cycle of buying and selling, loving and hating, embracing wholeheartedly and then forgetting, until you’re surrounded by barely used bottles in your bathroom cabinet and never-worn clothes for a trend that came and went by the time it arrived at your door. </p>
<p id="Vt0jax">This is to say nothing of the uneasy sensation of actually consuming TikTok, the reason that with every hour you spend on it, the app sends you a little PSA to maybe get off your phone and do something else for a while. Scrolling TikTok is the visual equivalent of a sensory deprivation tank, the adult version of transfixed toddlers staring at an iPad. It is a machine specifically engineered to get you to dissociate. In the span of about 30 seconds, you can watch a funny video of a puppy leaping into the snow, a sexy fan edit of a popular sci-fi franchise that may or may not be AI-generated, a poem about what it means to lose one’s mother, a makeup tutorial in which all the comments are people making fun of the person’s weight, a 22-year-old articulating why he doesn’t think his girlfriend should be allowed to hang out with other men. Unless you were enrolled in some kind of therapy intended to remove you from all groundedness in reality, nobody would argue that consuming in such a fashion is “good” for you. </p>
<h3 id="CqwmB4">TikTok isn’t the problem, actually</h3>
<p id="Z6vgzH">Lest it is not clear, I don’t think TikTok should be banned. I think the problems exacerbated by TikTok are the same problems exacerbated by algorithmically powered social media as a whole. The only winners of TikTok being banned would be Meta and Alphabet (i.e., Instagram and YouTube), companies that, while not carrying the political baggage of being based in China, are <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-facebook-files-11631713039">far more responsible</a> for the sorry state of humanity <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/science/2022/jan/02/attention-span-focus-screens-apps-smartphones-social-media">under attention capitalism</a> than TikTok.</p>
<p id="IC6hG9">In a <a href="https://www.currentaffairs.org/2023/03/how-capitalism-is-killing-our-attention-spans">fascinating interview with Current Affairs,</a> author of <em>Stolen Focus: Why You Can’t Pay Attention</em> Johann Hari explains how social media distracts us from what’s important by shoving meaningless controversy in our faces. “How can we come together and achieve anything if we can’t listen and are constantly screaming at each other and constantly interacting through mediums designed to make us angry and hateful towards each other?” he asks. It’s not only collective action that social media makes us miss out on, though; Hari argues that when our attention is constantly fractured, you miss out on the less tangible aspects of what makes a full life. “If you can’t focus, you can’t form proper deep friendships and achieve meaningful work. You can’t have a meaningful life if you don’t experience depth and attention.”</p>
<p id="jyEPgB">Few people, including Hari, are advocating that social media should be banned altogether. It’s simply not compatible with the idea of a free and open internet, which, unless the US decides to erect its own version of China’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/jun/29/the-great-firewall-of-china-xi-jinpings-internet-shutdown">Great Firewall</a>, is the internet Americans live in. That’s not to argue that major social media companies should be allowed to exist the way they have for the past decade and a half, which is to say by doing whatever they want and enticing people to spend as much time as possible on their websites.</p>
<p id="RQrdSW">Hari uses the example of how mothers in the 1970s rallied together to push back against the lead industry, which for decades <a href="https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/12/how-the-leaded-fuel-was-sold-for-100-years-despite-knowing-health-risks/2/">had knowingly caused</a> mental and psychological problems in children. “They didn’t say, ‘let’s ban all cars and gasoline’,” he explains, “they said: let’s ban the leaded gasoline and force the companies to move to a different business model that doesn’t poison our children.”</p>
<p id="66g8Io">What would a business model for social media look like that didn’t prioritize time spent on the app? Hari suggests something like a subscription model, making users of social media sites the true customers, as opposed to the advertisers shopping for users’ data. “Suddenly, they’re not asking, ‘How do we hack and invade Nathan?’ Instead, they’re asking, ‘What does Nathan want?’” The other model would be something like the BBC, an independent but partially taxpayer-funded media institution, he says: “Think about the sewers: everyone listening or reading is near a sewer. Before we had sewers, we had sewage in the streets, people got cholera, and it was terrible. We all pay to build the sewers, and own and maintain them together. We might want to own the information pipes together, because we’re getting the equivalent of cholera, but with our attention and our politics.”</p>
<p id="YADkz8">Making either of these changes would require an enormous psychic leap, particularly for Americans, whose fealty to the free market runs core to our identity. But Hari urges us to imagine it anyway. “We are not medieval peasants begging at the courts of King Zuckerberg and King Musk for a few little crumbs of attention from their table,” he says. “We are the free citizens of democracies, and we own our own minds. And together, we can take them back if we’re determined to.”</p>
<p class="c-end-para" id="BCIrpr">I don’t think that banning TikTok is a step toward democracy. That we are even considering it does, however, reveal that companies are not kings; that they are subject to the rule of law just as we are. It’s possible that if Americans can envision a world in which an entire, hugely powerful social network is kicked out of our country, perhaps more of them can be transformed into a force that works for us rather than against us. Personally, I’d start by taking a hard look at the companies that have been here longer. </p>
<p id="LdNSUi"><em>This column was first published in the Vox Culture newsletter. </em><a href="https://www.vox.com/pages/newsletters"><em>Sign up here</em></a><em> so you don’t miss the next one, plus get newsletter exclusives. </em></p>
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https://www.vox.com/culture/23660355/tiktok-ban-cultural-impactRebecca Jennings