US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said in a statement that he “applauds” the text.which among other things would allow applications like TikTok to be banned.
The bipartisan bill “would allow the United States to prevent certain foreign states from exploiting technological services (…) in ways that threaten the confidentiality of American data and our national security,” Sullivan wrote.
Several congressmen consider the video platform, which belongs to the Chinese group ByteDance, as a threat to national security.
As in an increasing number of Western countriesen, US lawmakers fear that Beijing could access the data of users around the world through this application, what TikTok has denied for years.
“It is widely known that TikTok constitutes a threat to our national security,” Republican Senator John Thune declared Tuesday at the bill’s presentation.
It may interest: Global battle against TikTok: why did it start and what can it lead to?
Specifically, this law baptized as “Law of restriction” gives the Commerce department new powers to veto the app.
Another bill in the House of Representatives also passed a key stage last week, and at the end of February the White House ordered the withdrawal of all federal agency devices within 30 days, in compliance with another law passed by the President Joe Biden.
For its part, TikTok -which claims to have more than 100 million users in the United States- said that banning the app would be tantamount to “muzzling the freedom of expression” of millions.
The app already surpasses YouTube, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook in “time spent” by American adults.
The entrance US advances in banning TikTok was first published on newspaper TODAY.
