Social-Media
Trump is issuing TikTok a fresh deadline: 90 days instead of 45 days.
President Trump signed an executive order on Friday granting ByteDance 90 days to either sell or break off his TikTok company in the US.
There is convincing proof that leads me to conclude that ByteDance is ... Might take action that seeks to weaken the national security of the United States, Trump wrote in his directive, referring to national security issues. ByteDance is headquartered in China, and the Trump administration reportedly indicated that the firm might exchange knowledge about the Americans with the Chinese government. The organization declined to do so.
The step gives TikTok a bit of a reprimand from Trump's August 6th directive that would have blocked all US deals with ByteDance, TikTok's parent company, leading to what the president referred to as an attempt to "fix the national emergency with respect to the information and communication technology supply chain." Initially, TikTok had the September 20th deadline; now it has until November 20th.
The new executive order allows ByteDance to delete all TikTok data from US customers and to report to the Foreign Investment Committee in the United States until all data has been deleted.
ByteDance will also delete all data obtained from the TikTok predecessor app Musical.ly that was acquired by the company in 2017. The initial order with a duration of 45 days did not contain such requirements.
As we've said before, TikTok is loved by 100 million Americans because it's a place of entertainment, self-expression, and connection, TikTok said in an e-mail to The Verge on Friday. We are committed to continuing to bring joy to families and meaningful careers to those who have been building on our platform for many years to come.
Microsoft was thinking of purchasing TikTok — though co-founder Bill Gates has since dubbed the proposed acquisition a "poisoned chalice"—and rumors last week indicated that Twitter was still involved. It's not clear how Friday's executive order affects potential sales, but Microsoft said it expected to conclude no later than September 15, 2020. Theoretically, Trump's original timeline would have been enough for Microsoft, so we're curious if anything has changed.
