Remember when Trump tried to ban TikTok for fear of China surveilling United States citizens? Well, the ever-popular social media platform is going for round two with US lawmakers – a group of Senators has just introduced a bipartisan bill that could neutralize the app.
The aim of the RESTRICT Act is to “identify and mitigate foreign threats to information and communications technology products and services,” and would empower the United States government to be able to ban TikTok should it be deemed a threat to national data security.
Yahoo! Finance reports that shares of competing social media providers like Meta and Snap saw a spike in response to the news. In the event that TikTok gets definitively banned, analysts speaking with the publications potentially see more upside for the aforementioned stocks, as well as Google.
We’re not financial advisors, but do you hate TikTok and would be glad to see it banned? Do you think odds are high that it’s going to get the boot? Third, and most importantly, are you feeling lucky, punk? If you answered yes to all three questions, perhaps it’s time to snap up a couple of volatile tech stocks.
As a refresher, TikTok is under scrutiny because the government is concerned that the platform’s Chinese-owned parent company ByteDance may be sharing US user data with China’s government. Said data could be used by Beijing to not only surveil United States citizens but also to influence what they see on the platform.
This fear was a cause for concern for former US President Donald Trump, who signed an executive order back in 2020 to have the app banned. The order was blocked in courts and later rescinded by his successor, President Joe Biden. In a tense political climate between the United States and China, the data security concern surrounding TikTok has cropped up once again.
In any case, care to figure out how to do the latest ‘moon phase soulmate’ trend on the platform? Prying eyes from across the world may or may not be included, carry on at your own discretion.
