According to Reuters, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that the United States ‘is indeed discussing’ the ban on Chinese social media applications, including TikTok .
US To Block TikTok
Pompeo said in an exclusive interview with Fox News: ‘I don’t want to get out in front of the President (Donald Trump), but it’s something we’re looking at.’
That’s not difficult to guess US lawmakers’ concerns are related to the user data handled by the app. They are worried about Chinese laws requiring domestic companies ‘to support and cooperate with intelligence work controlled by the Chinese Communist Party.’
Interestingly, this app is not available in China. TikTok has sought to distance itself from its Chinese roots to appeal to a global audience. And it has emphasized its independence from China.
Gizchina News of the week
Moreover, it seems the app will withdraw from Hong Kong market. ‘Considering recent events, we decided to stop operating the TikTok application in Hong Kong’, a TikTok spokesperson said in response to related questions.
In response, ByteDance China CEO Zhang Nan said: ‘Douyin has many users in Hong Kong and will continue to provide services to Hong Kong users’.
In the Hong Kong market in China, TikTok and Douyin exist at the same time. According to existing information, TikTok may cease operations in the Hong Kong market, but Douyin will continue to operate normally.
India Already Blocked TikTok
However, this is not the first large market that ‘doesn’t like’ TikTok and the way it operates. Just recently, India’s government decided to block 59 Chinese mobile apps, including TikTok. Apart from the latter, QQ, WeChat and other popular apps will be banned as well.
As SensorTower reports, in the first half of 2020, the app was downloaded nearly 600 million times. Thus, we are dealing with the most popular mobile application in the first half of 2020. In March this year, many countries around the world were blocked due to the epidemic. So its downloads surged to 115 million times. And since April and May, the downloads have remained over 100 million.
SensorTower said that in the first half of this year, its downloads were increased by 88.7% over the same period last year. The top three markets were India, Brazil, and the United States, accounting for 27.5%, 9.6%, and 8.2% respectively. Globally, TikTok is still undergoing rapid fission.
