Trump Signs Decree Banning TikTok and WeChat in the U.S.
The U.S. President Donald Trump has signed two decrees that prohibit US citizens from entering into deals and transactions with Chinese companies ByteDance and Tencent, as well as their subsidiaries. These companies own the TikTok short video service and the WeChat messenger. The decrees are published on the official website of the White House. The orders will take effect on September 20.
Trump focuses out that the apps proceed to debilitate US national security and economy. “To ensure the safety of our country, I have taken steps to address the risk postured by the TikTok app. Further activity is required to address a similar danger outgoing by another portable application, WeChat,” the report says.
Trump claims that, like TikTok, WeChat collects tremendous sums of data from its clients. Such information collection gives access to individual and secret data of Americans, the president is sure.
At the same time, an agent of the White House clarified to the Los Angeles Times that the boycott would as it applied to the WeChat application, and the rest of Tencent’s structures would not be influenced by this ban.
The US authorities are not satisfied with the TikTok’s data protection policy, and they also fear that TikTok may have an impact on the course of the upcoming presidential elections. A ByteDance spokesman said TikTok has not and will not share information with the Chinese government.
On August 6, the Financial Times, citing sources, reported that Microsoft is negotiating the purchase of all TikTok divisions, including Indian and European, and a week ago the company was going to acquire only TikTok divisions in the USA, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.
The US President demanded that the deal to buy TikTok be closed by September 15, otherwise the service will be blocked in the country. Trump also said that “it might be easier to buy the whole piece than 30% of it.” The president stressed that whoever buys TikTok’s US arm will have to pay “a lot of money” to the US Treasury.
Reuters sources reported that Microsoft will acquire a controlling stake in TikTok for between $15 billion and $30 billion, and minority stakes may go to funds – shareholders of ByteDance. In the event of a purchase, Microsoft promised to conduct a thorough review of the processing of personal data on the social network and “bring economic benefits to the United States”.
As we can see, the struggle is flaring up more and more, and the whole world is following this news. Hurry up and install a reliable VPN you can really rely on. Who knows what news from the world of internet censorship will shock us tomorrow.
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