TikTok being banned in America, expert says

The possibility of TikTok being banned in America is becoming more likely as regulators and lawmakers from both sides of the political aisle are concerned about its ties to China and one regulatory expert says recent events leave the U.S. no choice but to restrict the social media giant.

Nazak Nikakhtar, a former U.S. assistant secretary of commerce and current chair of the national security practice at Wiley Rein LLP, told FOX Business that there are few options left for the U.S. government to mitigate the national security risks posed by Americans' use of the app.

CFIUS has been looking into TikTok since 2019 and last week unless the parent company of the platform's Beijing-based parent company ByteDance divests its stake in the platform's U.S. operations because of concerns that the Chinese government has access to user's data.

Nikakhtar said that the move by the Biden administration was a significant escalation in the debate.

Nikakhtar has extensive experience in auditing Chinese companies on behalf of the U.S. government and said regulators found national security risks associated with the use of the TikTok app and tried to mitigate them.

She added that forcing ByteDance to divest wouldn't solve the problem, because TikTok's software was created by a Chinese entity and would still hold those characteristics like manipulative algorithms if it were spun off.

On Thursday, just hours before TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew appeared before Congress to assure Congress that ByteDance would not share user data with Beijing The Wall Street Journal reported China's Commerce Ministry announced that it would oppose the forced sale or divesture of Tiktok.

Nikakhtar, an expert in CFIUS investigations and protocols, said that the Chinese government has no choice but to address the grave national security risks through any other mechanisms, and has put ByteDance on the Entity List that restricts certain foreign businesses deemed to be a threat, because of the Chinese government's opposition to a TikTok sale.

If federal regulators are not willing to issue a ban, Congress must step in and do so, according to Nikakhtar, who was born in Iran and lived through the revolution.

She said it is dangerous to allow surveillance states like China to have access to Americans' data, or manipulate what Americans see through algorithms, because we are in an information war and our enemies will try to use whatever they can against the U.S.

Americans just don't understand with these crazy, fanatical, totalitarian regimes, Nikakhtar told FOX Business that surveillance states will try every method possible to weaken their adversaries. It's easy to see how a country that went to totalitarian is for me, because I'm born in a country that just went to totalitarian. Nikakhtar encourages users of TikTok to find another platform on their own.

She said that you don't want to embolden someone who is trying to destroy America and destroy America's friends. At the same time, you don't want your brain infused with what they want you to understand rather than what the truth is.