ByteDance, the Beijing-based company behind the short-video app Tiktok, has announced that its willing to sell off its American operations completely. The company hopes that by doing this, it'll be able to keep the Trump administration from banning the app in the US.
The Trump administration has had its eye on banning TikTok for a while now. According to The Verge, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on July 7th that a ban was "something we're looking at," and just yesterday, Trump himself told reporters on Air Force One that he'd give the order to ban TikTok via executive action as early as today. In response to this, ByteDance offered to sell TikTok off while keeping a minority share in the company, but the US government rejected this.
Reuters states that ByteDance's plan now is to exit from the US branch of TikTok completely and hand over control to Microsoft. Some of ByteDance's US investors (70% of TikTok's investors come from the US) may also be given minority shares under this new plan. ByteDance's concession is to test whether Trump is willing to ban an app that has over 80 million daily followers in the United States alone.
Much of TikTok's scrutiny and criticism comes from its privacy practices and the possibility of what it might do with the data it collects from users. While other social media apps and major technology companies also collect data for marketing purposes and more, TikTok faces extra scrutiny due to its potential ties to the Chinese government. In light of the deteriorating relationships between China and the US and China's history of censorship, TikTok has become a major sticking point for the two countries.
The United States isn't the only company that has been suspicious of TikTok. Back in July, India officially banned TikTok along with 58 other Chinese-developed apps from the country. India's government claimed it did this due to citizens complaining over their data's security and breaches of privacy. Like the US, India also has a tense relationship with China after a violent border dispute in the Himalayas this June left 20 Indian soldiers dead, resulting in a wave of anti-Chinese sentiment.