The United States has taken a major step toward banning the wildly popular TikTok app through a project backed by the White House, as Western mistrust of the Chinese social network grows.
American National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said in a statement that he welcomed the draft law that was sent to Congress that day with "applause", and among other things, it enables the ban of applications like TikTok, reports Hina.
The text proposed by the Democratic and Republican senators, "will allow the US government to prevent some foreign countries from using technological services (...) in a way that threatens the confidential information of Americans and our national security", wrote the adviser of the White House.
Many American lawmakers consider the platform for short and viral videos, owned by the Chinese group ByteDance, a threat to national security.
They are concerned, like a growing number of Western governments, that Beijing could access user data from around the world through the app, which TikTok has denied for years.
In particular, a bill called the "Restrict Act" gives the Commerce Department more powers to ban the app.
Banning the app would mean "rescinding the freedom of speech" of millions of Americans, protests TikTok, which claims it has more than XNUMX million users in the United States.
In late February, the White House ordered federal agencies to remove TikTok from their smartphones within 30 days, based on a law signed by President Joe Biden in early January.
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