Pakistan Bans TikTok Over Inmmoral Content
US President, Donald Trump has revealed plans to ban TikTok app in the country through executive authority.
The president, who disclosed this while flying home from Florida on Friday evening said he would sign an executive order on Saturday, August 1, 2020.
The app, which allows users to film and share short videos of themselves along to accompanying music, is owned by a Chinese company, ByteDance.
Meanwhile, US lawmakers have raised national security concerns over TikTok’s handling of user data, accusing the short-form video app of being a threat to national security because of its ties to China.
They also alleged that the company could be compelled to support and cooperate with intelligence work controlled by the Chinese Communist Party.
However, a New York City-based nonprofit advocacy organization, the American Civil Liberties Union said banning TikTok is a danger to free expression and technologically impractical.
Reacting to the impending move, a TikTok spokesperson told ABC News that 100 million Americans come to TikTok for entertainment and connection, especially during the pandemic.
He added that the company has hired nearly 1,000 people to their U.S. team in 2020 with the plan to hire another 10,000 employees into great paying jobs across the US.
It was gathered that TikTok has an estimated 65 million to 80 million users in the United States.
In the meantime, Microsoft has held talks to acquire TikTok, whose Chinese owner ByteDance faces mounting pressure from the US government to sell the app or risk being blacklisted in the country.
The approach to buy TikTok was at an early stage, and it was unclear whether Microsoft would succeed in taking it over, as the transaction faced multiple hurdles.