Opinion | With TikTok and China, the World’s Democracies Have Played the Sucker for Far Too Long
Some have argued that TikTok should be left alone to preserve a free and open internet. They argue that to treat China differently would fragment the network. That gets things backward. China, Russia, Iran and other nations have long since broken from any “one internet” vision with their blocking, shutdowns and censorship. This month, American policymakers demonstrated that doing so has consequences.
That China is in violation of established norms is not in question. In 2022, more than 60 nations signed a “Declaration for the Future of the Internet” enumerating basic online principles that all nations should respect (China, Russia and other nations declined to sign): no shutdowns around elections, no surveillance of political opponents, no bans on lawful content. While no country is perfect, only nations like Russia, Iran and Cuba can rival China in their flagrant violations of these principles. Freedom House, which measures internet freedoms, rates Iceland at 94 out of 100, Russia at 21 and China at 9. That alone is grounds to disqualify it from controlling what is now one the world’s most important social media networks.
If the United States refuses to enforce the principles of internet freedom and openness, it makes a mockery of them. I will be the first to admit that even the United States has at times failed to respect these principles, particularly when it comes to state surveillance. But the answer is not to throw up our hands and declare that there is nothing to be done.
ByteDance, for its part, maintains that it is not actually subject to control by the Chinese government. The weight of the evidence suggests otherwise: The Chinese state owns a “golden share” in the company, the firm is based in China, and studies suggest that the government shapes TikTok content in accordance with party preferences. ByteDance has said it has no plans to sell TikTok; but that might merely be a means of driving up the price. What the company now has is a golden opportunity to prove its independence for once and for all: by selling TikTok and taking the money.
It is true that only a few American companies — such as Oracle, Microsoft and Meta — have the money to buy TikTok, and I’ll admit that should Meta or Google acquire it, they would have a dangerous amount of control over one their greatest competitors. But that need not be the future of the company. TikTok’s current investors could partner with individuals, such as the Canadian investor and businessman Kevin O’Leary, to turn it “into an American company,” as Mr. Leary has said he wants to do. TikTok could even be run as a nonprofit, and perhaps begin a move toward a less toxic business model.
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