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@TheChiefNerd “The bill poses significant risk of being Patriot Act 2.0…There’s no way to argue this language isn’t vague and could invite abuse…An Elon or a Trump or you take Rumble for example, which is also accused of being a Russian agent, they could be forced to divest the company or have it be banned.”

House Republican leadership is moving forward with a vote on a bipartisan bill that would force ByteDance to sell TikTok — or face a ban — next Wednesday, despite former President Donald Trump’s public opposition to the measure. House Republican leaders huddled Friday morning to confirm the House would move forward on the TikTok bill with plans to bring it to the House floor under suspension, a maneuver that speeds the process and limits amendments to bills that can win a two-thirds majority vote, according to two sources familiar with the plans. The legislation from Reps. Mike Gallagher, R-Wis. and...

Momentum seemed to be on their side of US lawmakers this year to stop 150 million Americans from using TikTok. What happened? Banning TikTok in the US seemed almost inevitable at the start of 2023. The previous year saw a trickle of legislative actions against the short-form video app, after dozens of individual states barred TikTok from government devices in late 2022 over security concerns. At the top of the new year, the US House followed suit, and four universities blocked TikTok from campus wifi. The move would effectively require TikTok and WeChat to shut down in the US or...

Chinese-owned video streaming platform TikTok has reportedly been asking users for their iPhone passwords in order to view content, sparking concern among individuals using the app.Reports that the platform began asking users to enter their iPhone passwords in order to watch videos on the app first began emerging in November, according to Dexerto, with the publication noting users took to social media to raise the alarm.Yet TikTok—which is owned by ByteDance, a Chinese company that moved its headquarters to Singapore in 2020—has not explained the reasoning behind the need for users to enter their highly personal and sensitive information.Dexerto noted...

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) and Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) got into a heated exchange over the ban of the China-owned app TikTok in the U.S. Paul hit the brakes on Hawley’s proposed bill to ban the platform, arguing it would limit free speech and emulate censorship from the Chinese government. In a speech on the Senate floor, Hawley requested unanimous consent on the No TikTok on United States Devices Act, legislation he introduced in January, warning that American data is being collected on the social media app by the platform’s Beijing-based parent company, ByteDance. “We acted just a few months...