"As far as TikTok is concerned, we're banning them from the United States," Trump said to reporters while aboard Air Force One.
President Donald Trump talks about the possibility of banning social media app TikTok based on concern by US security officials that the app, owned by Chinese firm ByteDance, could be used to collect the personal data of Americans. Although such concerns of cybersecurity experts that data ends up in the hands of the Chinese government, Tiktok claims resistance to any hypothetical attempts of Beijing to seize the information.
The app has grown exponentially, amounting to a total of 80 million active monthly users in America and the ban would be a major blow for ByteDance.
Microsoft has reportedly been in talks to buy the app from ByteDance, but Mr Trump appeared to cast doubt that such a deal would be allowed to go through. If the deal went ahead reports say it would involve ByteDance shedding TikTok's US operations.
Furthermore, cybersecurity experts have said TikTok's potential risk to national security is largely theoretical and that there is no evidence to suggest that TikTok's user data has been compromised by Chinese intelligence.
Written by Daniela Matos
Artwork by Zara Masood
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