Donald Trump said on Friday that he and Xi Jinping had agreed to approve a deal over TikTok. “He approved the TikTok deal,” Trump said about Xi to reporters in the Oval Office, suggesting the leaders signed off on a preliminary agreement. But Trump offered no details about the agreement or when it would be signed. The American and Chinese leaders had connected over a phone call earlier in the day, the first direct contact between the two leaders since June. China and the US have been at loggerheads over…
Tag: TikTok
Trump celebrates TikTok deal as Beijing suggests US app would use China’s algorithm
Donald Trump has claimed his administration has reached a deal with China to keep TikTok operating in the US, amid uncertainty over what shape the final agreement will take, with suggestions from the Chinese side that Beijing would retain control of the algorithm that powers the site’s video feed. “We have a deal on TikTok … We have a group of very big companies that want to buy it,” Trump said on Tuesday, without providing further details. The deal, which was negotiated in Madrid between US treasury secretary Scott Bessent…
US and China reach deal to transfer TikTok ownership, trade officials say
Jamieson Greer, a US trade representative, said on Monday that Washington and Beijing have struck a framework agreement on transferring TikTok to US-controlled ownership. Speaking after emerging from negotiations with Chinese officials, Scott Bessent said the deal was coming but declined to reveal the commercial terms. “We have a framework for a TikTok deal,” the treasury secretary told reporters after coming out of high-level talks in Madrid. “We’re not going to talk about the commercial terms of the deal. It’s between two private parties, but the commercial terms have been…
TikTok owner set to launch share buyback valuing company at $330bn
ByteDance, the owner of the short-video app TikTok, is set to launch a new employee share buyback that will value the Chinese technology giant at more than $330bn, driven by continued revenue growth, said three people with knowledge of the matter. The company plans to offer current employees $200.41 per share in the repurchase program, the people said, up 5.5% from $189.90 each it offered them about six months ago which valued ByteDance at roughly $315bn. The buyback is expected to be launched in the autumn. The latest buyback at…
Trump to start TikTok sale talks with China, he says, with deal ‘pretty much’ reached
Donald Trump has said he will start talking to China on Monday or Tuesday about a possible TikTok deal. The United States president said the US “pretty much” had a deal on the sale of the TikTok short-video app. “I think we’re gonna start Monday or Tuesday … talking to China – perhaps President Xi or one of his representatives – but we would, we pretty much have a deal,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One on Friday. Trump also said he might visit Xi Jinping in China or…
Frequent TikTok users in Taiwan more likely to agree with pro-China narratives, study finds
Taiwanese people who spend large amounts of time on TikTok are more likely to agree with some pro-China narratives, a survey has suggested. The study, conducted by the Taiwan-based DoubleThink Lab, surveyed people across Taiwan in March, asking a series of questions about politics and democracy in Taiwan and China, and their views on unification of the two sides. It found that among the respondents, agreement with criticisms of Taiwan’s domestic issues, and with the prospect of unifying with China, rose as TikTok use increased, before dropping again among the…
Draining cities dry: the giant tech companies queueing up to build datacentres in drought-hit Latin America
It is a warehouse the size of 12 football pitches that promises to create much-needed jobs and development in Caucaia city, north-east Brazil. But it won’t have shelves stocked with products. This vast building will be a datacentre, believed to be earmarked for TikTok, the Chinese-owned video-sharing app, as part of a 55bn reais (£7.3bn) project to expand its global datacentre infrastructure. As the demand for supercomputer facilities rises, fuelled by the AI boom, Brazil is attracting more and more tech companies. The choice of Caucaia is no accident. Several…
TikTok breached EU advertising transparency laws, commission says
The European Commission has said TikTok is in breach of EU digital laws that require transparency over who pays for advertising. The commission reached a preliminary verdict on the Chinese-owned short video platform’s advertising policy, having launched an investigation in February 2024. The company could face a fine of 6% of global annual turnover, if the commission upholds this view. The commission said a separate EU inquiry into TikTok’s suspected failure to guarantee election integrity in Romania, which was launched last December, was ongoing and was a priority. The commission’s…
TikTok fined €530m by Irish regulator for failing to guarantee China would not access user data
TikTok has been fined €530m (£452m) by an Irish watchdog over a failure to guarantee that European user data sent to China would not be accessed by the Chinese government. Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC) regulates TikTok across the European Economic Area (EEA), which includes all 27 EU member states plus Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway. It found the Chinese-owned video-sharing app breached general data protection regulation (GDPR) by not addressing whether EEA user data sent to China would be shielded from that country’s authorities. The DPC said: “TikTok did not…
Why is US threatening to ban TikTok and will other countries follow suit?
Joe Biden has signed into law a bill that requires TikTok’s Chinese owner to sell the social media app’s US operations or face a ban, after the Senate passed the legislation. The law, part of a foreign aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, sets the clock ticking on a potential ban for a platform that is hugely popular in the US. Here is a guide to the TikTok legislation and what may happen next. How does the legislation pave the way for a sale or ban? The bill gives…