Opinion: Why the U.S. will probably never ban TikTok – By Aynne Kokas (Los Angelese Times) / Mar 22 2023
The world’s most downloaded app appears to be in hot water. The Biden administration demanded last week that the Chinese-owned TikTok be sold or else face a national ban in the U.S. due to security and privacy concerns, and the TikTok CEO will testify about these issues before Congress on Thursday.
The app presents genuine national security risks that the U.S. government must contend with. But the reality is that a nationwide ban or forced divestment would be hard to achieve.
Concerns have been mounting around TikTok’s alarming history around user data protection. A class-action lawsuit contending that the app sends private, personally identifiable data and biometrics to third parties without user consent settled for one of the largest payouts in the history of privacy lawsuits — $92 million — in 2021. The FBI and Justice Department are also investigating ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, for using the app to surveil American citizens, including journalists. The U.S., United Kingdom, Canada and European Union have already banned TikTok on government devices. India banned the app nationwide in 2020.
