Chinese short-form video app TikTok is facing renewed calls for a blanket ban in the U.S. after Senator Josh Hawley (R) confirmed plans to introduce a bill to ban the app for good. Owned and operated by Chinese tech firm ByteDance, TikTok has often courted controversies and faced persistent calls for a ban from U.S. politicians. Back in 2020, then-President Donald Trump threatened to ban the app after naming it as a national security threat. The ban never materialized, and the app went from strength to strength in the country and around the world.U.S. Senator Josh Hawley is now planning to introduce legislation that could ban the popular social media app TikTok in the country. In a Twitter post this week, Hawley accused the app of being “China’s backdoor into Americans’ lives,” and claimed that it threatens the privacy and mental health of American children. To address the problem, the Republican senator from Missouri is looking to introduce legislation to ban it nationwide. Hawley, however, did not say when he plans to introduce the bill, nor did he offer any documentation that proves his claims about the app being a national security threat.
Fresh Calls To Ban TikTok In The U.S.
Following Hawley’s Tweet, TikTok claimed that the Senator’s approach towards national security is misguided. In a statement to Reuters, the company said “Senator Hawley’s call for a total ban of TikTok takes a piecemeal approach to national security and a piecemeal approach to broad industry issues like data security, privacy, and online harms.” The statement went on to say that Hawley should look to address his concerns “holistically, rather than pretending that banning a single service would solve any of the problems he’s concerned about or make Americans any safer.”
Hawley’s tweet comes a month after Congress passed a bill to ban TikTok on all government devices across the country. The bill, which has since been signed into law by President Joe Biden, prohibits the use of TikTok by federal government employees on devices owned by any federal government agency. There are, however, some exceptions for law enforcement, national security, and research purposes.
Last month’s federal ban came after several U.S. states banned state employees from using TikTok on their government-issued devices. Two of the latest states to have implemented the ban include Wisconsin and North Carolina. More than 20 other states have also banned the app from their respective state devices, including Ohio, New Jersey, Arkansas, South Dakota, and more. Despite the myriad of controversies related to national security and misinformation, TikTok remains one of the most popular social media apps in the U.S. and around the world, and its popularity doesn’t look like it’s diminishing any time soon.
