Montana Governor Greg Gianforte simply signed the nation’s strongest restrictions on Chinese language-owned social media app TikTok into regulation.
TikTok has confronted mounting stress within the U.S. from Congress and state legislatures alike in current months, however Montana’s actions escalate these threats significantly, even when the problem of enforcement stays an open query.
“At this time, Montana takes probably the most decisive motion of any state to guard Montanans’ non-public information and delicate private data from being harvested by the Chinese language Communist Occasion,” Gianforte mentioned.
In a press release, Gianforte claimed that it’s “effectively documented” that TikTok shares its information with the Chinese language authorities — a declare that isn’t substantiated by public details about the app and the way it operates.
Whereas there’s no proof that TikTok or its mother or father firm ByteDance have ever shared the app’s data with the Chinese language authorities, TikTok has admitted to an incident during which staff spied on journalists’ places utilizing app information — a scandal that’s typically cited in conversations across the app and privateness considerations.
Lawmakers in Montana unveiled the TikTok ban invoice earlier this yr, kicking off a firestorm of debate across the ban and different proposals to restrict the app’s use within the U.S. Whereas restrictions on using TikTok on authorities units and campus networks are already commonplace, Montana’s ban is designed to dam app shops from distributing the app to any customers throughout the state.
Whether or not that might even be possible stays to be seen. Google and Apple are prone to push again on state-level legal guidelines that restrict the place apps might be downloaded throughout the U.S. lest they face the logistical nightmare of extra states legislatures issuing their very own bans in opposition to TikTok or different apps. TikTok’s customers are prone to push again too, and the corporate has already been leveraging its enthusiastic person base to oppose the Montana regulation.
There are a ton of unknowns about how this can all play out, however the one certainty is that Montana’s latest regulation is certain to face some sturdy challenges in courtroom within the coming months. We’ll be following alongside to see the way it all goes down.
