The US TikTok ban bill has now passed the House of Representatives, hinting at a possible ban. Now the US government is requiring a sale of TikTok to an American firm within a year. This is an improvement from the previous requirement that demanded that TikTok move over to American ownership in six months.
Users of TikTok in the US are kicking against this ban, considering the existence of their businesses on the platform. Currently, over 170 million Americans are using TikTok daily, and this ban will affect each one of them. According to TikTok, this incoming ban will be an infringement on “the free speech rights of 170 million Americans”.
The video-sharing platform goes on to point out that this ban will “devastate 7 million businesses” that currently exist on the platform. This ban will go on to “shutter a platform that contributes $24 billion to the US economy, annually.” Now that’s not only a loss to TikTok but also to the US government considering the platform’s contribution to the US citizens and the government as well.
In the US House of Representatives, this new ban bill got a 360-58 vote in favour of the bill. According to the House, this bill will protect Americans from data leaking to TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance. Failure to sell in under one year will mean the removal of TikTok from both the US App Store and Play Store.
This US TikTok ban will only affect the region, so if you don’t live in this region, you won’t feel the effect. TikTok doesn’t seem to be ready to sell in the US as it stands its ground against the ban. We expect to see the US Congress reaction to this bill and this will determine if it gets passed into law.