WHAT’S NEXT FOR TIKTOK AND ITS US USERS AFTER HOUSE APPROVES BAN

Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles. Copying articles to share with others is a breach of FT.com T&Cs and Copyright Policy. Email licensing@ft.com to buy additional rights. Subscribers may share up to 10 or 20 articles per month using the gift article service. More information can be found here. https://www.ft.com/content/6857cfc9-077d-493f-945d-eafd1ba5bb20 The US House of Representatives’ approval of a bill to ban TikTok from app stores unless it is sold by its Chinese parent company has confirmed the video-sharing platform as one of the biggest flashpoints in a wider US-China conflict and has ignited a debate about free speech and data security. The overwhelming support for the bill has signalled widespread agreement in Washington that TikTok represents a threat to American national security while it is owned by ByteDance. The Chinese company has accused lawmakers of “jamming through” “secret” legislation to ban the app outright, and called on the Senate to reject the bill. Here is what the vote means for TikTok and its 170mn users in the US. How would a ban work? If the bill passes the Senate and is signed into law by President Joe Biden, ByteDance will have six months to sell TikTok to a non-Chinese company or it will be removed from app stores. Web access would be blocked in the US. The law would work by imposing civil penalties on app stores such as Apple’s App Store and Google Play if they distribute or update TikTok. Internet service providers would be compelled to block access to TikTok on the web. Although app stores and internet providers would be barred from hosting TikTok, individual users would not be subject to any legal enforcement. A nationwide ban of an app or website is largely uncharted territory for the US — although there has been some precedent at both state and federal levels in recent years. The state of Montana passed a bill last year to ban TikTok, also by forcing its removal from app stores accessed from inside the state. However, the bill was blocked by a federal judge in November before it was due to go into effect on January 1. Montana is appealing against the decision. The American government and many individual states have separately banned TikTok on government-owned devices in a bid to keep US data safe from China. Canada and policymaking institutions in the EU have issued similar directives.