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taxiya

Brigadier
Registered Member
BoraTas said:
In my opinion if the ban goes through TikTok should just cease its US operations. They have the rest of the world and money. Let American investors and youth hold the "progressive" democrats accountable.
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Tiktok should setup VPN everywhere and continue making money from Americans, that would be a change of tide.

[Addition]
Preferably setting VPNs in Europoe, SK and Japan so US must fight and block its allies.
 
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Stierlitz

Junior Member
Registered Member
That said, there’s the crucial question of whether it would survive legal scrutiny. A federal court recently overturned a Montana law that sought to ban TikTok. Though legislators sponsoring the US House bill argue that it is narrow in scope and would not amount to a total ban on TikTok that would violate the First Amendment, some legal experts believe otherwise.

“In my view, this loaded gun is a ban in all but name, and banning TikTok is obviously unconstitutional,” said Ramya Krishnan, a staff attorney at the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University. “This ban on TikTok is materially the same [as the Montana ban] in all the ways that matter.”
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But legal experts say that an indirect ban may still be unconstitutional under the First Amendment. Civil society groups including the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Democracy and Technology wrote in a recent letter to federal lawmakers that jeopardizing access to TikTok — ”home to massive amounts of protected speech and association” — also “jeopardizes access to free expression.” There are also arguably less restrictive and more effective means of protecting any national security interests at stake in this bill, they asserted, considering the Chinese government could continue to access Americans’ data in other ways.

“This bill would functionally ban the distribution of TikTok in the United States, and would grant the President broad new powers to ban other social media platforms based on their country of origin,” they said in the letter.

Many experts believe it is unlikely that the government will be able to meet the high standard to prove that TikTok poses privacy and national security concerns that can’t otherwise be resolved, said Kate Ruane, director of CDT’s Free Expression Project. Lawmakers have publicly cited concerns about the Chinese government using the app to spy on Americans and to spread propaganda that could be used to influence the 2024 presidential election.
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However, national security experts have also questioned the rationale behind a ban. Mike German, a former FBI special agent and fellow at the Brennan Centre for Justice’s Liberty and National Security Program, told Al Jazeera that, like many American apps, TikTok collects data on its users that a foreign government could theoretically use for its own hostile purposes. But those governments could just as well buy Americans’ data on a legitimate open market, where the sale of that data remains unrestricted.

And even if lawmakers did provide more evidence of national security concerns, it’s still not clear that the ban would pass legal muster.

Courts have already applied strict scrutiny to previous attempts to ban TikTok. A federal judge blocked the Montana TikTok ban — which also imposed a financial penalty on TikTok and any app store hosting it each time a user accesses or is offered the ability to access the app — before it was scheduled to go into effect in November.

Montana lawmakers justified the ban as a means of protecting the privacy interests of consumers in the state. But US District Judge Donald Molloy wrote in his ruling that the law overstepped the Montana legislature’s powers and left “little doubt that Montana’s legislature and Attorney General were more interested in targeting China’s ostensible role in TikTok than with protecting Montana consumers.”
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BoraTas

BoraTas

Captain
Registered Member
Overbom said:
If TikTok is banned in the US, the rest of the West will ban it as well
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They couldn't get all of the West to ban Huawei despite massive pressure. They couldn't get Europe to fully sever ties with China in space exploration either. Semiconductor bans took 2 years despite the US having multiple chokeholds over that industry. Unlike many other China related matters, the TikTok ban directly affect lives of millions. A lot of young people spend hours on it daily and some depend on it for their fame and income. Most European parties aren't in position to do anything that would offend people in numbers. They are usually in power by a few percentage points.
 
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zbb

Junior Member
Registered Member
BoraTas said:
They couldn't get all of the West to ban Huawei despite massive pressure. They couldn't get Europe to fully sever ties with China in space exploration either. Semiconductor bans took 2 years despite the US having multiple chokeholds over that industry. Unlike many other China related matters, the TikTok ban directly affect lives of millions. A lot of young people spend hours on it daily and some depend on it for their fame and income. Most European parties aren't in position to do anything that would offend people in numbers. They are usually in power by a few percentage points.
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They want to ban TikTok from app stores operated by American companies Apple and Google, which essentially is a worldwide ban.
 
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taxiya

Brigadier
Registered Member
zbb said:
They want to ban TikTok from app stores operated by American companies Apple and Google, which essentially is a worldwide ban.
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You know Apple and Google stores operating in EU is under EU law. EU has put heavy fines on Google when it did not meet the EU regulations and US did nothing to defend Google. So no, US alone is not a worldwide ban in any way. US has to force EU to legally ban TikTok which is what @BoraTas was talking about.

I think it is a wide spread misunderstanding that US can extend its will beyond its border unhindered simply because of its companies operate elsewhere, especially in EU. The fact is that EU law demand Google and Apple to store data gathered in EU to be stored physically inside EU and passing beyond EU border must be regulated by EU agencies. This applies equally to both China and US or any other countries' company. Huawei had its cloud servers in EU (serving EU) and was not punished, while Google got punished. From EU I often got blocked by American site saying that their website are not availabe to EU because they don't comply to EU cyber regulations. That tells how much "love" or lack of EU has towards US.

[Addition]
TikTok is a Singaporean company. Singapore is one of the few countries that has signed agreement with EU on cyber security and data protections, US has NOT. So banning a Singaporean company in EU solely on the ground of US lobby without EU law will trigger Singapore's legal action and jeopardize any ongoing negotiations including with China and India etc. I doubt if EU is willing to open that can of worms without opening up their domestic legislation procedure first.
 
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