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Zuckerberg Reportedly Pushed Trump To Ban TikTok

Mark Zuckerber Building Global Community with Artificial Intelligence

The TikTok video platform is currently under great political pressure in the United States. The government wants to block the service unless the US business is given up. The Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg does not seem to be completely uninvolved.

As the Wall Street Journal reports, Mark Zuckerberg directed himself against TikTok last year and criticized the growing influence of Chinese companies. According to him, US companies value freedom of expression. On TikTok, on the other hand, certain content, such as the mention of protest movements, is censored. Zuckerberg is said to have taken this point of view at a private dinner with Trump. The rapid growth of Chinese companies like TikTok threatens the economy and is a more important topic than the regulation of their own social media platform.

Talks with several senators

Mark Zuckerberg is said to have spoken not only with the president but also with several senators in the U.S. government. Then the Democrat Chuck Schumer called for an investigation by TikTok, which was then initiated by the government. In addition, Facebook founded the lobby organization of American Edge this year. The group works for US IT companies and their role in the economy.

TikTok needs to be sold now

The US government accuses the TikTok operator Bytedance of forwarding user data to the Chinese government. As a result, the group was forced to sell its US business to a US company. If not adopted by November, the service could be banned and suspended in the United States. TikTok had already announced that it would sue this decision. In addition to Microsoft, Twitter and Oracle are also interested in taking over TikTok. However, for reasons of competition law, Facebook itself has no way of buying up TikTok. TikTok on the other hand has plans to sue the U.S. government which is illegally forcing it to leave the market.
August 25, 2020

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