• ObsidianZed@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    10 months ago

    I’m curious, is there an actual plan to ban TikTok? How do they think they can accomplish that? And just how easy will it be to circumvent the ban?

    • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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      10 months ago

      Having read through the bill, here’s how it works:

      1. TikTok/ByteDance is mentioned specifically in the bill, so they have 270 days (iirc) to divest of “adversary country” influence (meaning China, Iran, Russia, N. Korea), meaning they’d have to be sold to a company based in a non-adversary country
      2. assuming they don’t comply with 1, any app store or ISP *hosting provider* would be fined if they continue to preserve access to the app
      3. users can still use the app, but they have have network access blocked while in the US - so you’d have to use a VPN to use the app

      So to circumvent it, basically use a VPN to use the app, and for updates, you’d probably need to side-load on Android or something similar. I don’t know how Apple’s store works well enough to know what options users have to install and update the app after the ban.

      That said, there is no provision for making it illegal to use the app, the onus is entirely on companies facilitating access to the app.

      Edit: I was wrong about the ISP. After a reread, it’s talking about server hosting. So a server cannot be hosted in the US, nor can a server in the US distribute copies of the app, or host source code for the app.