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As TikTok faces a looming January 19 ban in the United States, reports have been plentiful revealing which billionaires and public figures are considering buying the Chinese app, like a report claiming China is considering selling their popular platform to Tesla Founder and X CEO Elon Musk — a report that TikTok claims is “pure fiction.”
On Monday (January 13), days ahead of the January 19 deadline to sell the popular app TikTok, Bloomberg reported that China was considering selling to Elon Musk. However, a representative for China-based TikTok shut down and denied the reports about offloading their shares in the app to Elon Musk, telling Variety, “We can’t be expected to comment on pure fiction.”
As mentioned in our previous updates, TikTok, the app based in China, faces a potential ban in the United States due to a law that is set to come into effect on January 19. This ban could be halted if the Supreme Court intervenes with a ruling against the prohibition. The legislation, known as the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, restricts app stores operated by Apple and Google, as well as web-hosting services, from offering or hosting TikTok within the U.S. This restriction will remain in place unless ByteDance divests its ownership of the app to a third party located in a nation not classified as a “foreign adversary” by the United States.
Thus far, TikTok’s Chinese owner (ByteDance, which is based in Beijing) has been incessantly fighting the ban against them, likely relying on claims that President-elect Donald Trump would delay the ban and seek a better solution once he is inaugurated and takes office on January 20.
On Friday, January 10, the Supreme Court listened to arguments regarding TikTok's emergency appeal to halt the impending ban set for January 19. During the proceedings, TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, contended that the legislation infringes upon the First Amendment rights of users in the United States, which number around 170 million.
The Supreme Court Justices seem to lean towards supporting the U.S. government, which contends that TikTok poses a national security risk due to its ownership by the Chinese Communist Party. In response to the ban enacted by the U.S. government on January 19, TikTok's parent company, ByteDance, based in China, maintains that it will not divest its roughly 40% interest in the app; this includes not selling to any potential buyers or investors, such as Elon Musk, according to recent reports.
The U.S. government has mandated the company to proceed accordingly, with their consent; however, Chinese officials have previously indicated that any attempt by ByteDance to divest its interest in TikTok would face obstruction, as it constitutes a technology export.
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