Reuters report that the owner of TikTok, ByteDance has agreed to divest completely from its US operations to save being banned. This decision came after Trump announced to ban the app altogether in the US. Further, the US operations will be handled by Microsoft, which is held responsible for securing the US TikTok data centre.
ByteDance Agreed to Divest From it’s TikTok US Wing
The Trump’s administration has long been hinting to ban the popular Chinese short-video platform, TikTok from the US citing various reasons. The app has been caught with numerous security vulnerabilities and most importantly, it was considered to be a spy app due to hailing from China.
While the security vulnerabilities are true in most cases, TikTok claimed it was never demanded any user data by the Chinese government. Yet, the US secretary, Mike Pompeo has earlier said the US government is thinking of banning the app, which is today confirmed by Donald Trump directly to the press reporters outside White House.
And now, sources to Reuters say that ByteDance, owner of TikTok has agreed to divest completely from its US operations to keep the platform alive in the US. The decision was made to appease Trump’s administration to let TikTok continue in the US as per their laws! Thus, it will be handed over to Microsoft for handling the local users’ data in US data centres, and also some other
Further, some ByteDance investors that are based in the US will be given a chance to own a part of TikTok US. ByteDance has earlier revealed to be owning at least some share of the US wing even after giving away to Microsoft, but the White House rejected this proposal.