April 11, 2024 – According to multiple media reports on April 10th local time, the chairman of the US Senate Commerce Committee revealed that senators are discussing an extension of the deadline for ByteDance to divest TikTok (the international version of Douyin) to one year.
Previously, on March 13th, the US House of Representatives voted to pass the “Protecting Americans from Foreign-Controlled Applications Act.” This act mandates that ByteDance must divest control of TikTok within approximately six months, failing which TikTok would face a ban in the United States, embodying the principle of “sell or be banned.”
The Chairman expressed her support for the idea of extending the deadline to a year, stating, “I guess this will be a good element to ensure success.” If the deadline is extended, the TikTok ban would be postponed until 2025, after this year’s presidential election in November.
TikTok had previously stated that it had spent $1.5 billion to protect user data in the United States and keep it within the country.
