New bill will give the Commerce Secretary the power to ban TikTok, Sen. Warner says

A caller bipartisan measure volition empower the Secretary of Commerce to instrumentality enactment against exertion companies based successful six overseas adversary nations, which would see China-based TikTok proprietor ByteDance, including banning them altogether, Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., said successful an interrogation connected CNBC's "Squawk Box" Tuesday.

The six countries included successful the measure are China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela and Cuba, Warner said.

He's acceptable to present the authorities with Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., astatine a 3 p.m. ET property league connected Tuesday, marking the latest connection seeking to bounds the hazard of the Chinese authorities influencing U.S. users done the fashionable video-sharing app.

Last week, the House Foreign Affairs Committee passed a Republican-sponsored measure with akin goals on enactment lines. Still, respective Democrats connected the committee said they would similar to enactment specified a proposal, but hoped for much clip and collaboration successful crafting it.

TikTok has repeatedly said it does not store U.S. idiosyncratic information successful China and has taken steps to physique a program to further trim the hazard of power from the Chinese government. The institution did not instantly respond to a petition for comment.

Warner said helium believes the hazard that the Chinese authorities could nonstop TikTok to propulsion oregon suppress definite messages is based connected the imaginable for harm owed to Chinese authorities entree to U.S. users, alternatively than presently known issues. But, helium said, the connection would necessitate the quality assemblage to question to declassify arsenic overmuch arsenic imaginable if the medication wants to opt for a ban, to marque the lawsuit to the nationalist for wherefore a exertion genuinely is simply a nationalist information risk.

"This contention with China astir who dominates exertion domains, that truly is wherever the nexus of nationalist information lies going forward," Warner said.

Warner acknowledged that TikTok users volition apt effort to find ways to get astir a ban, should 1 travel into place, similar by utilizing virtual backstage networks that tin obscure the determination from which a idiosyncratic is connecting to the internet. He added that the measure would not "go aft idiosyncratic users."

He said the measure is not solely meant to code TikTok, and alternatively should make a "systemic approach" that prevents the request for one-off actions.

TikTok is inactive successful discussions with the Committee connected Foreign Investment successful the U.S. (CFIUS), which has jurisdiction to reappraisal nationalist information risks stemming from ByteDance's 2017 acquisition of TikTok precursor Musical.ly. The institution has described an elaborate program known arsenic Project Texas meant to mitigate the anticipation of Chinese authorities power connected the app, but CFIUS indispensable inactive o.k. the plan.

"The Biden Administration does not request further authorization from Congress to code nationalist information concerns astir TikTok: it tin o.k. the woody negotiated with CFIUS implicit 2 years that it has spent the past six months reviewing," TikTok spokesperson Brooke Oberwetter told CNBC. "A U.S. prohibition connected TikTok is simply a prohibition connected the export of American civilization and values to the billion-plus radical who usage our work worldwide. We anticipation that Congress volition research solutions to their nationalist information concerns that won't person the effect of censoring the voices of millions of Americans."

TikTok's CEO, Shou Zi Chew, is acceptable to attest astatine a House Energy and Commerce Committee proceeding connected March 23.

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