Washington, (EFE)
The term “foreign enemy” includes China, Cuba, Iran, Russia, North Korea, and Venezuela.
The text seeks to “restrict the appearance of threats to security by communication and information technologies” and for this it gives the president, Joe Biden, and more specifically the Department of Commerce new powers to review, prevent and mitigate those threats. threats.
Democratic Senator Mark Warner and Republican John Thune, promoters of this regulation, recall that the information and communication technology supply chain has changed drastically in recent years.
Suppliers subject to the control of “autocratic” governments have appeared in the market, according to their statement, and their growth and dominance is seen as a risk to economic and national security.
the bill
The bill asks the Commerce Department to establish procedures to identify, prevent, veto, and mitigate transactions with technology products in which any foreign enemy is interested and poses “unacceptable risks.”
It gives priority to products used in critical infrastructures for the US Executive and also promotes educating the population on the risks they present by asking for information about their danger to be declassified.
“Before TikTok there were others. This goes beyond TikTok, it is a comprehensive approach,” Warner said at a press conference.
His statement points out that the growing concern unleashed by applications and products such as TikTok, WeChat or Alibaba has revealed the lack of coherent policies to identify the threats they pose.
The bill is designed to adapt to rapid technological changes and makes no secret that it could ultimately lead to the banning of those platforms or services.
“The Chinese Communist Party has shown in recent years that it is willing to lie about almost everything. It stands to reason that if he is willing to lie about his spy balloon, he will lie about using TikTok to spy on US citizens,” Thune stressed.
Concern about the algorithm and its influence
General Paul Nakasone, director of the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Department of Defense Cyber Command, had expressed this Tuesday his concern about this platform “because of the information it has, its algorithm and its influence,” according to what he indicated. before the Senate Armed Services Committee.
The application has more than 100 million users in the United States.
In mid-February, the CEO of TikTok, Shou Zi Chew, took his defense to the offices of the US Congress to try to convince different legislators that he is not a danger.
The administrative direction of Congress has already vetoed the download and use of TikTok from all government mobile devices and in late January two Republican legislators introduced another bill that seeks to ban the application on devices in the country.
TikTok’s parent company is the Chinese technology company ByteDance, which some criticize for having ties to the Chinese Communist Party, although TikTok denies allegations of this type, ensuring that it does not censor content or give the Chinese government access to its data.
The White House applauded the recently presented bill on Tuesday by highlighting, in the mouth of its National Security adviser, Jake Sullivan, that it authorizes the Executive to prevent certain Administrations from exploiting technological services that operate in the country in a way that supposes a risk.