The Real Solution to the TikTok Problem Is Obvious

Which, of course, means it will never be implemented

On March 23, Congress held a hearing about the social media platform TikTok. The media circus, where TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew was the sole witness, was the natural next step in the federal government’s war on TikTok, which dates to the Trump Administration.

Much like the Mark Zuckerberg hearing, the utter lack of technological competence exhibited by Congress was on full display. Rep. Richard Hudson (R-NC) asked Chew if TikTok has access to the “home Wi-Fi network,” implying Hudson is unsure about whether apps on his phone use Wi-Fi. Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-AZ) asked Chew unprompted whether he agrees that the Chinese government has “persecuted the Uyghur population,” an important question to be sure — and one Chew, who is from Singapore and a tech executive, not a diplomat, is entirely unqualified to answer.

TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew speaks to Congress | Photo Credit: Tom Williams

There were other nonsensical questions about kids under 13 using the app (banned since 1998 by the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act) and whether TikTok tracks the dilation of users’ pupils. The full transcript is available here if you want to pull your hair out.

Much of the line of questioning focused on TikTok’s connections to the Chinese government. TikTok is not a Chinese company — the equivalent app in China is called Douyin — but it is a subsidiary of ByteDance, which is Chinese. TikTok, however, is headquartered in Singapore and Los Angeles. Describing it as a Chinese company would be akin to declaring Google to be a Chinese company just because you can theoretically access it in China.

Their CEO, Chew, is not Chinese either. Despite the repeated and sinophobic insistence from the Congressional panel that he is in some way affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party, Chew is a Singaporean. He stated to the community that he lives there and is raising his kids there. Singapore is decidedly not China!

Of course, Congress has never been a body prone to letting facts get in the way of its feelings. Senators and Representatives of both parties have decided China = bad and TikTok = China. Therefore, in their minds, TikTok = China = bad, which means the platform must be banned. If Congress gets its way, the United States would join India, whose far-right prime minister Narendra Modi spearheaded a TikTok ban after Indian and Chinese troops clashed along their Himalayan border, as the only nation to ban TikTok for all.

Unfortunately for Congress, under current law there is no obvious way to ban a social media network.