It has been a bumpy week for China’s beleaguered technology giants. They are under increasing scrutiny overseas, and the communist party continues to tighten the screws on them at home. In many ways they are also their own worst enemies.
The UK has become the latest government to ban the Chinese-owned TikTok from government devices over security concerns. Parliament has also banned the app from its network. This follows similar bans from the European Union and 11 countries, including France, New Zealand, Denmark and the US. Western lawmakers are unconvinced by TikTok’s often cack-handed attempts to distance itself from its Chinese parent, ByteDance, and that company’s obligations to the Chinese communist party.
TikTok called Parliament’s move ‘misguided,’ and said it was ‘based on fundamental misconceptions about our company’.
But for Alicia Kearns, chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee, it was just a start. ‘It was a relief to see it happen,’ she told me.
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