Key Points
- A top U.S. lawmaker has “serious concerns” about the proposed TikTok deal.
- The main issue is the plan for the new U.S. company to license the algorithm from its Chinese parent.
- This raises fears that China could still have leverage over the app and its users.
- The lawmaker believes the new U.S. company should have to create its own brand-new algorithm.
The head of the House Select Committee on China is raising “serious concerns” about the proposed deal for TikTok’s U.S. operations, specifically targeting the plan to license the app’s powerful recommendation algorithm from its Chinese parent company, ByteDance.
Representative John Moolenaar, a Republican, said Thursday that any arrangement where China has “leverage over the algorithm” is a “problem.” His comments highlight the deep-seated fears in Washington that the Chinese government could use the algorithm to manipulate American users or access their data.
President Trump recently signed an executive order giving his blessing to a deal that would sell TikTok’s U.S. assets to a group of American and global investors. The White House has said that as part of the deal, the new U.S. company would license the algorithm from ByteDance, but that it would be “retrained and monitored” by U.S. security partners.
But Moolenaar isn’t convinced. “I just believe you have to have a new algorithm,” he said, adding that the whole deal is “still very much a work in progress.”
The 2024 law that set this whole process in motion was designed to force a clean break between TikTok’s U.S. operations and its Chinese ownership. The plan for a licensing agreement, which keeps a key piece of the technology tied to China, is a major sticking point for lawmakers who want to see a complete separation.
