Donald Trump signs executive orders banning TikTok and WeChat

[btc_angela]

And so the 'war' continues with China, as President Trumps signs executive orders banning Tiktok and WeChat.

United States President Donald Trump has signed two executive orders addressing what he has labelled as the threat posed by apps such as TikTok and WeChat.

The president is calling the pair of Chinese apps a "national emergency" with respect to the information and communications technology and services supply chain.

According to the first order that will take effect in 45 days, any transaction with TikTok's owner, ByteDance Ltd, or its subsidiaries, will be prohibited. The second order similarly prohibits any transaction that is related to WeChat by any person, or with respect to any property, subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, with Tencent Holdings.

The second order says that like TikTok, WeChat automatically captures vast swaths of information from its users, similarly noting again the ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

"WeChat, like TikTok, also reportedly censors content that the Chinese Communist Party deems politically sensitive and may also be used for disinformation campaigns that benefit the Chinese Communist Party," it adds.

"The United States must take aggressive action against the owner of WeChat to protect our national security."

https://www.zdnet.com/article/donald-trump-signs-executive-orders-banning-tiktok-and-wechat/

Lately we have some topics about this one and seems the community is divided. And it seems that Trump really take this "serious" threat from China. Let's see how Microsoft will react, they supposedly shows intention on buying TikTok.

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[InvoKing]

Lately we have some topics about this one and seems the community is divided. And it seems that Trump really take this "serious" threat from China. Let's see how Microsoft will react, they supposedly shows intention on buying TikTok.

Do not forget twitter, it joined the race too.
This guy doesn't care about Russia interfering with election since it is endorsing his re election, he doesn't care about the other US based companies and social media spying on everyone and the risk of being leaked to China.
In the other hand banning stupid things is always welcome.

[Kemarit]

Lately we have some topics about this one and seems the community is divided. And it seems that Trump really take this "serious" threat from China. Let's see how Microsoft will react, they supposedly shows intention on buying TikTok.

Do not forget twitter, it joined the race too.

Right, Twitter expressed interest in buying TikTok's U.S. operations

This guy doesn't care about Russia interfering with election since it is endorsing his re election, he doesn't care about the other US based companies and social media spying on everyone and the risk of being leaked to China.
In the other hand banning stupid things is always welcome.

Hah, you nail it, we don't know what's Trump agenda on China, but it's pretty obvious his sentiments against China. It's just the question on who is the likely President that will hate China even more, LOL. In other news,

"Gen z on their way to the White House when they find out trump is banning #TikTok"

https://twitter.com/treymarley22/status/1289456456631164930

[Jating]

It is just me who thinks that Trump is just making this excuse of "national emergency" to justify his executive order? I think he is over reacting and could really escalate things between the two countries which are already in the decline since the trade wars began.

And this could really start the next cold war, if haven't started it, but this time it is moving on the cyber space.

- Trump blames China for the corona virus
- Blocks wealthy Chinese from acquiring US companies
- The whole Huawei debacle

And now this one, it is really getting worst for Trump and his administrations image.

[Upgrade00]

The ban on Chinese apps is sort of a retaliatory attack by the Trump administration. For years China has been censoring the internet within the region through their Great Fire Wall (GFW), totally or partially restricting access to certain very popular websites including;.
• Facebook
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Wikipedia
• Instagram
• Twitch
• Pinterest
• Amazon
• Quora
• Amazon
• Imgur
• WhatsApp, etcetera

You can find the full list here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_websites_blocked_in_mainland_China
While restricting access to these websites, China would launch an alternative to satisfy their citizen's demand, hence growing their social markets and controlling the Internet.
Google very recently shut down a program which they planned on running in China - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-07-08/google-scrapped-cloud-initiative-in-china-sensitive-markets the reason could be growing tensions between both regions.
The GFW is also regularly being updated to keep up with changing programs which may attempt to circumvent it.

Data is like the digital spoils of war conflict and everyone wants to own it, spy on it, and stop others from getting theirs.

[DoubleEdgeEX]

Just a superficial order to please some voters. The US economy wouldn´t work without the cooperation with Chinese companies. The world has come closer and closer and so did global economic collaboration. Eventually money rules the world and politicians are just there to keep things as they are and put on a show for the public to make the deals less obvious

[abhiseshakana]

Hah, you nail it, we don't know what's Trump agenda on China, but it's pretty obvious his sentiments against China. It's just the question on who is the likely President that will hate China even more, LOL. In other news,

"Gen z on their way to the White House when they find out trump is banning #TikTok"

https://twitter.com/treymarley22/status/1289456456631164930

The phenomenon that the free market is getting away from America. Trump is a nationalist and Trump imitates China's strategy when protecting private Chinese from the onslaught of foreign platforms. Where China created and raised the Chinese version of the platform, including; Alibaba is China's Amazon, Wechat is China's WA, QQ is China's Gmail, Weibo is China's Twitter, Renren is China's FB, and apps like Baidu, Didi Chuxing, Baike, Nice and Youku. With the protection of the private state, China does not need to compete with foreign products, which in the end, even though they belong to the nationality, are owned by foreigners (happened in my country)

Trump as a nationalist sees that a large number of active users of Tik Tok around the world with a large capitalization is a national threat for America because it is global. Trump is trying to control globalists through pressure to divest and create similar applications. Will this Trump strategy reverse the habit of "oligarchs controlling government officials", becoming a state controlling oligarchs. National Threat is the reason that allows Trump to control Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Tik Tok.

[Charles-Tim]

There was a time when Android and many US companies backoff support a mobile phone giant, Huawei, the reason was because of the petition US government have against them that they are possibly helping to leak information from around the world including US for Chinese government. This was a great move by the US goverment.

The covid-19 pandemic is still even considered to be a artificially genetic modified virus which was produced from a laboratory from China. I consider this to be true as the virus later targetted USA. Now over 2.7 million people has contacted the disease in USA. It could be a weapon to reduce US power in the world by China.

Tiktok has now been considered a weapon by the US to leaking of information for China, I can not doubt this because China is doing everything to make sure to have the world power of which will not be good, a country that can sell to other countries and scattered all over the world to make progress but they do not make their country favorable for business from around the world, they did not support cryptocurrencies  but want to create their own digital yuan, they did not support social media from outside but they are making their own and their citizen have social media outside their country.

Donal Trump is right, they have to ban all Chinese company that they think could be providing information for Chinese goveremnts. Also, possibly WeChat could do that too and both have to banned from United States. The reason for the ban is because these social media apps are not trustworthy.

[Latviand]

Just a superficial order to please some voters. The US economy wouldn´t work without the cooperation with Chinese companies. The world has come closer and closer and so did global economic collaboration. Eventually money rules the world and politicians are just there to keep things as they are and put on a show for the public to make the deals less obvious

Even in the old times, China and US don't have any good relationship between them. Although they work together when it comes to the economy, but they have a serious conflict between some specific issues.

And now, they are expressing it by banning those foreign apps that is spreading in their country, especially Tiktok. There are a lot of users of Tiktok around the world but as there are rumors about its security and they say that the information are gathered in China so the privacy is not that safe.

That's the reason why US president Donald Trump pushes to ban this app to prevent and stop those China from benefiting US's economy.

[boyptc]

Meanwhile in China.

Social media app like Facebook has been banned for a long time, my Chinese cousin told me.

That's why they have their own messaging/social media like qq.

[tyz]

This is a shot in the arm because the Chinese government is now very likely to sign similar executive orders against American tech companies and this will mainly affect the world's most valuable company Apple. Those who own Apple shares should sell them directly and go short. Trump is thereby weakening the position of its own dominant IT industry. Basically those actions are right because China is a dictatorship, probably the biggest one mankind has ever seen, and it is necessary to take action against those regimes, but whether this is the right way forward is doubtful.

[mezzaluna]

And so the 'war' continues with China, as President Trumps signs executive orders banning Tiktok and WeChat.

United States President Donald Trump has signed two executive orders addressing what he has labelled as the threat posed by apps such as TikTok and WeChat.

The president is calling the pair of Chinese apps a "national emergency" with respect to the information and communications technology and services supply chain.

According to the first order that will take effect in 45 days, any transaction with TikTok's owner, ByteDance Ltd, or its subsidiaries, will be prohibited. The second order similarly prohibits any transaction that is related to WeChat by any person, or with respect to any property, subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, with Tencent Holdings.

The second order says that like TikTok, WeChat automatically captures vast swaths of information from its users, similarly noting again the ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

"WeChat, like TikTok, also reportedly censors content that the Chinese Communist Party deems politically sensitive and may also be used for disinformation campaigns that benefit the Chinese Communist Party," it adds.

"The United States must take aggressive action against the owner of WeChat to protect our national security."

https://www.zdnet.com/article/donald-trump-signs-executive-orders-banning-tiktok-and-wechat/

Lately we have some topics about this one and seems the community is divided. And it seems that Trump really take this "serious" threat from China. Let's see how Microsoft will react, they supposedly shows intention on buying TikTok.

I don't even think that it can affect China's economy and also the economy of United States of America since people are only using it for entertainment and people in other places can download it for free and without the tax. Even though they are worrying about the security of their people, it would just damage their reputations as country but other countries with their own decisions would surely continue their transactions with countries like China and USA.

[Darkoth89]

This is a shot in the arm because the Chinese government is now very likely to sign similar executive orders against American tech companies and this will mainly affect the world's most valuable company Apple. Those who own Apple shares should sell them directly and go short. Trump is thereby weakening the position of its own dominant IT industry. Basically those actions are right because China is a dictatorship, probably the biggest one mankind has ever seen, and it is necessary to take action against those regimes, but whether this is the right way forward is doubtful.

But how would you sanction China without harming your own economy?! China is becoming increasingly important as a huge sales market. A lot of products we are using are produced in China or use parts that are imported from China. That's downside of a globalized production and market. You become vulnerable to economic sanctions. But that counts for both sides.

I'm all for reprimanding China but Trumps explanation for targeting WeChat and TikTok is very hypocritical. I don't wanna know what private data Facebook and Google are collecting from us all over the world. There are many reasons why China should be sanctioned. Above all their treatment of the Uighurs (as a German it's chilling to see videos how they are blindfolded and taken away by train. But that doesn't belong here in this topic). To really hurt China, the world has to act together. It does not help if one country goes it alone. Just look how China reacted when Australia blamed them for the pandemic.

[carlisle1]

Meanwhile in China.

Social media app like Facebook has been banned for a long time, my Chinese cousin told me.

That's why they have their own messaging/social media like qq.

Means that it's just equal and this executive orders from US Pres. Trump was already late.

Both leaders are showing their dominance, they are bringing things seriously a silent ways of saying that I'm not afraid and I'm willing to take you.

We don't know how far this two giant nations will go and how they will
move in the next coming days.

[bitbunnny]

USA and China don't have good relationship for a long time now and this is not a surprise. However, it seems that Trump has its own funny way to.solve problems and this will only make harm to US and to its own IT and communivations industry, not to China, so I don't see the point.

[ChiBitCTy]

Interesting, I thought I had last read that he was going to give Microsoft some time to possibly purchase the company before banning it.  I definitely don't support TikTok as I know it's used to steal a ton of information on it's users, but I'm not sure banning it was the right move.

China and the U.S. keep going back and forth, but we need each other in the end.

[plvbob0070]

We all know that China has been banning giant apps like Facebook even before. So if China does it, the US can also do what they want especially if they are seeing that TikTok is a threat to their people. But if they keep on doing such an act, it won't stop and might cause a bigger issue between the two.

As I searched for information about this issue, they still have time to find someone who will buy TikTok before they will officially ban it in the US.  What I think is that a giant company will still end up buying it, since we are also aware that the app is so popular right now so they can't just let it be down.

[lobat999]

We all know that China has been banning giant apps like Facebook even before. So if China does it, the US can also do what they want especially if they are seeing that TikTok is a threat to their people. But if they keep on doing such an act, it won't stop and might cause a bigger issue between the two.

I suppose President Trump has valid reasons to ban Tiktok and WeChat and I guess its more about national security since its very obvious that China is exerting its influence over many aspects of society through these social media giants - and this is much like how China feels by banning Facebook and Google - which I think this is also a response in light related to these previous incidents.

My only concern is that the U.S may find having a hard time banning these companies totally as we all know some people may find a way circumvent it not unless the U.S. lays down solid technical infrastructure to fully enforce this ban order.

[Lucius]

What Trump has done is nothing more than the continuation of a completely different policy towards China than the one that existed before. Those who follow this board know that India has done the same thing, with the difference that they banned as many as 59 Chinese apps. Conflicts between great powers have always existed, and what is actually changing is the way they play out - and now it is more than clear that the war has moved into the digital domain. As far as I am concerned, it is much better than a conventional war where people lose their lives, lose their property or become refugees.

On the other hand, if it turns out to be true that some US companies really want to buy these apps, then the policy directly helps to reduce the value of those companies before the sale happens. Again, from the position of a remote observer, I don't see much logic in banning such apps - except perhaps banning their use in places important to national security (security agencies, the Ministry of Defense, the White House).

The average Joe who uses TikTok at school, a fast food restaurant or in his apartment can't really endanger national security.

[jacafbiz]

Wechat and TikTok are both collateral damage here, Google and FaceBook are both guilty of data harvesting, the only thing I feel China has done wrong is the closed market it is practicing, if you ban other companies from your countries from doing business you don't need to be crying foul when you received the same treatment from others.