Senator Marco Rubio Demands TikTok Investigation for Censorship

China-based video app, TikTok, reached high levels of popularity in the last few years. However, some government officials — such as Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) — feel like the app might be posing a national security risk, and that it should be investigated for censorship. According to Rubio, Chinese apps are being used to censor content that the Chinese government might not like. Rubio presented his claims in a letter, which also called for a review and an investigation of the app by the Treasury Department’s Committee on Foreign Investment in the US.   The reason behind Rubio’s concerns might be a number of recent reports that state that moderators at TikTok have to censor videos that might not be approved by China’s authorities. However, this mostly includes incidents and topics that concern China itself, such as Tibetan independence, Tiananmen Square, and alike. TikTok responded to such concerns by claiming that the content and moderation policies are led by a separate team, based in the US itself. They also claimed that they are not influenced by any foreign government. Finally, they stated that the Chinese government did not ask that TikTok censors its content, and even if they did — the app operates outside of China’s jurisdiction, so they would not have a say in it, anyway. Rubio also addressed the Trump administration earlier this week, requesting that it enforces anti-boycott laws that would prevent and US person, subsidiary, or Chinese firm from complying with boycotts from foreign countries.

Today I will be asking CFIUS to review #TikTok’s acquisition of https://t.co/0wGGsvV96T.

Ample & growing evidence exists that TikTok’s platform for western markets, including the U.S., are censoring content in line with #China’s communist government directives.

— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) October 9, 2019

The situation in Hong Kong is also impacting events in the US, such as an entire week of retaliation from US-based fans and consumers towards organizations such as Blizzard and NBA. The reason for this was the fact that a professional Hearthstone player openly voiced support for the protests happening in Hong Kong right now. In response, Blizzard enforced a year-long ban that would prevent the player from joining the tournaments. What do you think about Senator Rubio’s demands? Do you think that Blizzard was wrong to ban the player, simply for voicing support for the protests? Tell us what you think in the comments below.

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