The US House of Representatives passed a bill 352 to 65 that would give TikTok’s owner, ByteDance, six months to divest its US assets or face a ban.
It was passed with bipartisan support, showing that Democrats and Republicans have reached a consensus on preventing China’s cognitive warfare. Its rapid approval is also considered an approach to resist China’s interference and influence on the US elections in November.
When the bill was first proposed, TikTok sent users in the US a push notification, urging them to call and pressure their representatives to vote against the bill. That perfectly suggests that it has the ability and intention to interfere in US politics.
TikTok has a rapidly growing market share in the US. Most users are young, among who are content creators making a living through it and are one of the main drivers behind protests against the TikTok legislation. Others claiming freedom of speech also speak out against it.
Most US congresspeople tend to support the bill even though they could lose young votes in the upcoming elections. That shows members of the US Congress’ strong will to protect the country from Chinese threats and to solve problems caused by TikTok.
As for European countries, the European Parliament has passed the Digital Services Act and the Digital Markets Act by a bipartisan vote to control and regulate social media platforms to an appropriate degree. The EU has also initiated investigations on whether TikTok breaches the rules.
The underlying purposes and reasons of the US’ TikTok ban might not be consistent with those of the EU, but both show how much concern Western countries have over the informational influence shaped by social media platforms.
TikTok in Taiwan has a lower market share than in the US. However, it promotes content worldwide regarding Chinese unification with Taiwan and that promotes cultural assimilation.
Concerns including non-guaranteed users’ privacy, addiction-inducing algorithms and lack of responsibility to censor content that is unsafe for the public or individuals remain unsolved. Western countries have been aware of that and passed bills to stop it, but Taiwan has no legislation that can hold the platform accountable for the dangers of content provided by its users.
The National Communications Commission previously drafted a digital law, but this was not passed due to concerns over the invasion of personal privacy. Since then, there has been no general consensus in Taiwan on the matter. That is not different from opening the gate welcoming China’s manipulation and data collection.
With rising market share of Chinese applications such as TikTok and Pinterest-like app Xiaohongshu — also known as Little Red Book — the government should refer to Western countries’ actions.
It is necessary to at least monitor Chinese social media platforms despite difficulties with placing a nationwide ban on them.
Hong Tsun-ming, originally from Hong Kong, is a specialist in the Taiwan Statebuilding Party’s international section.
Translated by Hsieh Yi-ching
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