Nothing says strong national security hygiene like letting “data collection” and “influence operations” fester! There was a big hubbub about the threat that TikTok posed to the American public. A Singaporean national got hounded over his alleged connections to China and the dance app went dark shy of 24 hours, but that’s been the only real public push against TikTok that we’ve seen for a while now. The bill that intends to ban TikTok and similar apps from foreign nations is still in play, but presidential deadline extensions are keeping everyone from making that final step to getting a VPN and migrating over to Xiaohongshu. CBS News has coverage:
President Trump has once again delayed the enforcement of a bipartisan law that would effectively ban TikTok in the U.S. A deal to separate TikTok from its China-based parent company, ByteDance, has remained elusive.
…
“As he has said many times, President Trump does not want TikTok to go dark. This extension will last 90 days, which the Administration will spend working to ensure this deal is closed so that the American people can continue to use TikTok with the assurance that their data is safe and secure,” Leavitt said in a statement.
I am a firm believer that the average person has no reason to worry about China stealing their data via TikTok — they’d have an easier job of just buying the intel directly from Palantir. Or Elon Musk. Or Facebook. Or Google.
Enjoy your next 90 days of TikToking! Unless tomorrow comes and Trump decides not to extend the deadline last minute. He’s flip flopped on worse things, after all.
Trump To Sign Order Extending TikTok Deadline Another 90 days, White House Says [CBS News]
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