And two. After the House of Representatives, Saturday April 20, the American Senate adopted a law this Tuesday April 23 that could lead to the banning of the TikTok application on its soil. The social network now only has one lifeline: a sale during the year to another company in line with the government’s wishes. Or to sum it up, one that is not Chinese. A prospect which considerably darkens its future across the Atlantic.
Started several years ago, the “TikTok ban” movement has suddenly accelerated in recent weeks. In March, a first bill had already passed the House of Representatives. But its particularities – a forced sale reduced to 6 months – had cooled a Senate that was still somewhat reluctant. The situation has changed. “There now seems to be a very strong transpartisan consensus,” notes French senator Claude Malhuret, rapporteur for a commission of inquiry into the most popular social network in the world today, to L’Express. The deadline for a possible resale of TikTok US has been extended to one year. Joe Biden validated the content of the text. Then the main instigators had the good intuition to include it in the vote on the military aid package provided to Ukraine as well as Israel, and the sanctions against Russia and Iran. Result: adoption in Congress was final.
It must be said that the reasons for concern have also progressed. More than ever, data leaks to their great Chinese adversary worry American legislators, despite the implementation of the “Texas” project for strict conservation of this data in the United States. Mid-April, a media investigation Fortune revealed that these precautions were in fact only “cosmetic”, data still circulating towards the parent company, ByteDance, subject to the control of the Communist Party. The approach of the presidential election and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have also exacerbated fears of disinformation, explains the New York Times. “It is a platform through which a third of American adults under 30 obtain information. And it is a network that is less easy to manage than a company under American law,” analyzes Charles Thibout, researcher associated with Iris (Institute of International and Strategic Relations), specialist in the role of transnational digital firms in international relations. This is also part of a new context of “global competition around artificial intelligence,” adds Senator Claude Malhuret. However, TikTok is a way for China to obtain a huge amount of data to train their models of AI.”
Like Huawei before him
Enough to make the sanction today inevitable. Especially since the only way to escape remains a sale to an actor compliant with the American government. Unlikely. Beijing has already spoken out against it on several occasions. The United States bill is “contrary to the principles of fair competition and international trade rules,” assured Wang Wenbin, a spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in mid-March. During 2023, another official said the country would “strongly oppose” a forced sale of TikTok. And in particular, to its powerful recommendation algorithm, its secret ingredient, also present on the Chinese version Douyin. “On paper, the price [de TikTok] could exceed 180 billion dollars”, points out the Financial Timeseven if a forced sale of only American activities would assess it ultimately, unless that. The amount nevertheless illustrates the difficulty of the operation. Only American Big Tech could claim this “mega-deal”. In 2021, Oracle and Microsoft tried this without success. Not Meta or Google. In truth, the forced withdrawal of this number 1 competitor is undoubtedly for them a less costly solution to the commercial challenges posed to them by TikTok.
For Claude Malhuret, the destiny of TikTok should thus follow that of “Huawei and ZTE”, these Chinese telecom operators suspected of espionage, and driven out of the United States in 2019. This new legislative pressure on TikTok results from a certain ” logical”, explains the latter, while most Western platforms have long been banned on the Chinese market. Threads and WhatsApp, from Meta, being the latest victims. Finally, such a ban would not be a first in the world. India was the first major nation to cut off access to its 200 million users of the social network. The United States currently has 30 fewer.
What about Europe and France?
Faced with the abyss, TikTok has two hopes. First, yet another political reversal. Donald Trump, Republican candidate for the White House, recently spoke out against a ban, preferring to attack Meta and his boss, whose name he deliberately misrepresents, Mark “Zuckerschmuck” (instead of Zuckerberg). Trump, however, is not a foolproof card: he was even the one who issued the first threats of a ban.
The other option favored by TikTok? The legal fight. According to the site The Information, the head of public affairs of the social network for the United States, Michael Beckerman, considers the bill contrary to the First Amendment of the American Constitution, protecting freedom of expression. The social network has won this fight numerous times at the federal level, between 2020 and 2023, and is entering with a certain amount of confidence. “There is a chance that the case will end up before the Supreme Court,” estimates Charles Thibout. “It will therefore take years before a possible ban is definitively ratified.” Unless the United States is, in the meantime, smarter. Other angles of attack would perhaps make it possible to win the case more quickly. “The First Amendment does not protect espionage,” commented Republican Senator Brendan Carr, very involved in the fight against TikTok.
If all these dikes fall, attention will likely turn to its allies on the Old Continent, who are also attacking the social network and its recent “lite” version. “With the DSA and the DMAs, European countries have transferred to the Commission the power to take sanctions against technological platforms,” recalls Claude Malhuret. The very strong commercial links maintained by France and Germany with China nevertheless make a rapid banning of the application unlikely. The Huawei case, once again, is an illustration of this. Despite incentives from the United States to get rid of it completely, the Chinese manufacturer is still established on European territory. It even plans to open its first telecom equipment manufacturing factory, in eastern France, by 2026.
.