Technology @lemmy.world Ghostalmedia @lemmy.world 6mo ago

Senate passes bill forcing TikTok’s parent company to sell or face ban, sends to Biden for signature. Biden expected to sign on Wed.

apnews.com Senate passes bill forcing TikTok's parent company to sell or face ban, sends to Biden for signature

The Senate has passed legislation that would force TikTok’s China-based parent company to sell the social media platform under the threat of a ban, a contentious move by U.S. lawmakers that’s expected to face legal challenges and disrupt the lives of content creators who rely on the short-form video

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I don’t really use TikTok but I really hope this gets tossed by the courts. I don’t care if ByteDance is owned by cthulus and draculas, it’s a terrible precedent to have the government ban a media company. If we don’t like China having access to data, ban apps from collecting it in the first place. Require algorithm audits. There are so many better ways to handle this than singling out TikTok.
- Everybody talks about Facebook like they’re owned by the American government. They’re not. I’m sure the US government gets massive amounts of data from them, but they can’t control Facebook in the way China can control Tik Tok. And much of their surveillance is public with warrants whereas China does not need to follow any of that.
  
  with warrants
  
  Yeah, maybe.
  
  I get it. But it’s night and day different than the actual government owning the company.
  
  The Chinese government doesn't own Tik Tok, either.
  
  If you think the Chinese government doesn’t have its hand directly up in Tik Tok, you’re absolutely fooling yourself. China has much more direct control over companies, well beyond what the US government has.
  
  So this bill is not going to do anything but require ByteDance to sell the tiny small insignificant minuscule 1% that the Chinese government owns and in no way uses to influence how the company is run.
  
  Sounds like it’s no big deal!
- Don't forget, control the sale of data too. Audits etc to make sure they comply with privacy safeguards, and so on.
  
  This is just pandering as well as, I suspect, to give a corporate donor a profit-making business.
- The precedent was already set back in 2020 when the US government forced Kunlun to sell Grindr
- it’s a terrible precedent to have the government ban a media company
  
  Good thing TikTok's not actually being banned then isn't it? It's just being forcibly sold, which is quite different.

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