Chinese govt ‘firmly opposes’ a potential forced sale of TikTok

Any forced sale of Tik Tok will be strongly opposed, said China, in response to demands by the Biden administration that the app’s Chinese owners sell their share of the company or face a ban.

This development came as TikTok CEO Shou Chew testified in front of US lawmakers amid increasing scrutiny over the app’s ties to China. On Thursday, China's commerce ministry said a forced sale of TikTok would "seriously damage" global investors’ confidence in the United States.

China opposes forced sale of TikTok

"If the news about a forced sale is true, China will firmly oppose it," Shu Jueting, a spokeswoman for the ministry, told a Thursday news conference in Beijing, adding that any potential deal would need approval from the Chinese government. The sale or divestiture of TikTok involves technology export, and administrative licencing procedures must be performed in accordance with Chinese laws and regulations," she said. "The Chinese government will make a decision in accordance with the law," she added, reported ANI.

Earlier, Beijing didn’t focus much on a potential forced sale. In early 2020, however, it signalled it wanted to protect Chinese technology by adding recommendation algorithms, which could include TikTok’s, to a list of technologies restricted for export. In his first congressional hearing, Chew on Thursday sought to provide nuanced answers and assuage lawmakers’ worries about the company and its parent, Beijing-based Bytedance. But he was frequently interrupted by lawmakers. After an hour-long testimony, the lawmakers expressed deep skepticism about his company’s attempts to protect US user data and ease concerns about its ties to China, per ANI report.

According to analysts, the US will put more pressure on China to ban TikTok if the company does not spin itself off from its Chinese parent. According to Chew’s latest response and Beijing’s previous actions, the Chinese government may have veto power over the sale. Earlier in December, Chinese officials had proposed tightening the rules that govern the sale of content-based recommendation algorithms to foreign buyers.

It is believed that the algorithm of TikTok keeps the users engaged, and this is the key to the application's success. The recommendation that appears on the feed is based on the information the algorithms gather about the users’ behaviour, thus pushing videos they actually like and want to watch. The first algorithm was added by Chinese regulators to the restricted list of technologies in August 2020, when the foreign minister threatened to ban TikTok unless it was sold.

Image: AP