TikTok is facing challenges ahead: President Joe Biden signed a bipartisan legislation in April that requires ByteDance, the Chinese parent company of the popular social media app, to sell its majority stake to a U.S.-based firm. Failure to comply with this mandate will result in a ban of the app in the United States.
Various questionable arguments have been used against TikTok. However, Congress’ primary reason for pushing the divestiture is the concern that the app’s Chinese owners have ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), posing a significant national security risk due to potential influence from the CCP. There is evidence suggesting that the Chinese government pressures TikTok to censor content related to sensitive topics like Tiananmen Square, Falun Gong, and criticism of Chinese President Xi Jinping.
It’s worth noting that the U.S. government has also exerted pressure on American tech companies to censor content on social media platforms. Revelations from investigations like the Twitter Files and the Facebook Files have shown that federal agencies instructed social media platforms to remove content on various topics, including Hunter Biden and COVID-19. President Biden even criticized these companies for not complying with pandemic-related directives and threatened action against them.
If Congress genuinely wanted to address government censorship on social media, they could focus on reining in federal agencies. However, their attention is solely on TikTok, which has responded by filing a lawsuit.
The legislation signed by Biden applies to any social media company designated as a “foreign adversary controlled application.” Current U.S. law identifies China, North Korea, Russia, and Iran as foreign adversaries. The law specifies that an app will be considered controlled by a foreign adversary if it meets one of three criteria: being based in one of those countries, having a 20 percent government ownership stake, or being subject to “direction or control” by a foreign adversary.
This law sets a precedent for potential action against other social media companies beyond TikTok. Following the 2016 election, accusations were made against Facebook and Twitter for allegedly aiding Russia in spreading misinformation. While subsequent studies have shown minimal impact from foreign influence campaigns on the election outcome, the bill’s passage indicates a potential future where apps could be punished based on vague connections to foreign adversaries.
Despite the legislation, direct action against Facebook or other platforms is not imminent. However, the language used in the bill, specifically “direction and control,” leaves room for potential abuse by government officials to target apps that diverge from mainstream views and associate them with foreign adversaries.
This article was originally published under the title “The TikTok Slippery Slope.”
