With that, the blog is closed for today. Please see our full summary of the hearing here, and thanks for reading!
What’s next for TikTok?
It’s hard to know where we go from here.
Members of the committee appeared unwavering in their conviction that TikTok was a tool that could be exploited by the CCP – a conviction that was ultimately bolstered by today’s WSJ report indicating the Chinese government would not approve a sale of TikTok.
Lawmakers outside of the committee are also unconvinced. US Senators Mark R Warner and John Thune said in a statement that all Chinese companies “are ultimately required to do the bidding of Chinese intelligence services, should they be called upon to do so” and that nothing Chew said in his testimony assuaged those concerns. Colorado Senator Michael Bennet reiterated calls for an all out ban of TikTok, saying that Chew’s testimony is a departure from what Chew told Bennet in a private meeting weeks prior to the hearing.
“When he was in my office, the CEO admitted to me that my interpretation of Chinese law was correct, which was that any time the CPP wanted to say: we’re going to have the data turned over, that ByteDance, and therefore TikTok, had a legal obligation to turn that data over. Now he’s saying something different in his testimony to the committee.”
But a coalition of civil liberties, privacy and security groups including Fight for the Future, the Center for Democracy and Technology and the American Civil Liberties Union have written a letter opposing a ban, arguing that it would violate constitutional rights to freedom of expression.
“If passed by Congress and enacted into law, a nationwide ban on TikTok would have serious ramifications for free expression in the digital sphere, infringing on Americans’ First Amendment rights and setting a potent and worrying precedent in a time of increased censorship of internet users around the world,” the letter reads.
Where the coalition and many members of the House committee agree is that there is a pressing need for a federal data privacy regulation that protects consumer information.
Multiple members of the House committee on energy and commerce mentioned a proposed federal bipartisan privacy bill, the American Data Privacy Act, and the need for such a regulation to rein in TikTok. The coalition agrees: federal regulations could address the data-privacy issues the entire tech industry shares with TikTok.
“A comprehensive consumer privacy bill would limit data commodification, thereby dramatically increasing users’ security online. A robust privacy bill could address concerns not just at TikTok but across the multiple social media platforms,” the letter continues.
Updated
