TikTok at risk of US ban as ByteDance faces pressure to sell

VPN workaround may not be effective

TikTok is at risk of being banned in the U.S. if Chinese parent ByteDance won’t sell its stake. Millions of Americans who use the popular video app are left wondering what that means for them. Some fans of the service may turn to virtual private networks (VPNs) to try and connect to TikTok should a ban take place, a workaround that can make it seem like their internet connection is coming from a different country. But that loophole may not be so easy to exploit.

CFIUS evaluating national security concerns

The Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. (CFIUS) is the interagency body evaluating national security concerns around the app to determine how to minimize risk if it continues to operate domestically. The group can recommend to President Joe Biden that ByteDance’s 2017 acquisition of Musical.ly, a TikTok precursor, be unwound, forcing a sale of those assets.

Forced sale would be complex step

TikTok has recommended a mitigation plan as an alternative to a forced sale. But that’s a longshot solution as CFIUS already threatened a ban if ByteDance won’t sell its stake. A forced sale would be a complex step, requiring a years-old transaction to be unwound. The Trump administration pursued that route once before to no avail.

Government may have to turn to legislation to block app access

The government may have to turn to legislation or executive orders to get app distributors, ISPs and cloud services to block access to TikTok. While there will likely always be cracks that can be exploited by a subset of computer literate users, the typical consumer would find it difficult to access a government banned service.

Security concerns

Concerns around TikTok’s security risk come down to two main issues. The first is who can access U.S. consumer information and the second is who has the ability to determine what information reaches U.S. users. Under Chinese law, companies can be required to hand over internal information to the government for supposed national security purposes. TikTok has sought to reassure the U.S. government that U.S. user data is stored outside of China.

Legislators mistrustful of China

TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew, who’s set to testify before a U.S. House panel next week, told The Wall Street Journal that Project Texas would do just as much as divestment to resolve any security concerns. But the mood in Washington isn’t moving in TikTok’s favor, and legislators have lost whatever trust they once may have had in China and its motives.

Consumers in unfamiliar territory

When it comes to consumer technology, users have no idea what information is making its way to the Chinese government. And the U.S. government has a lot of work to do to provide clarity on what would happen if the app was to be banned. “Trying to police data access is very, very difficult, especially when there’s suspicion that the folks who are doing this have a reason to do it,” Schmidt said. “And they’re heavily incentivized to collect this information and use it for all kinds of purposes.”

Value of data to bad actors

While many users may think their casual social media use would be of little interest to a foreign government, Schmidt said that data can have a surprising amount of value to bad actors. “Having information about your habits and your interests and your interactions and where you go and what you do could be used for things like either phishing attacks to get access to more information, or for things like blackmail, if you’re doing things that you might not want other people to know about,” Schmidt said.

Unknown territory for US companies

It’s unfamiliar territory for U.S. companies, in contrast to China, which blocks access to all sorts of content, including most major U.S. internet services. “Trying to police data access is very, very difficult, especially when there’s suspicion that the folks who are doing this have a reason to do it,” Schmidt said. “And they’re heavily incentivized to collect this information and use it for all kinds of purposes.”

Credit: https://www.cnbc.com/2023/03/17/how-a-tiktok-ban-in-the-us-might-work-and-challenges-it-raises.html

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