Shou Zi Chew

It’s nearly impossible to discount the role that TikTok has played in the modern music scene, for better or for worse. From artists being forced to churn out TikTok hits to classics from the 60's getting a breath of fresh air, TikTok isn’t leaving the music industryany time soon. Now, it would appear that the social media platform’s parent company ByteDance is piloting exclusive distribution deals with musicians.Will Banning TikTok Solve Privacy Issues? | Future TechA report from The Information details ByteDance’s plans…

A handful of ByteDance employees in the US and China tracked a cat’s TikTok account in order to find the IP address of its owner, a reporter covering the company. Buffy, a black and white Maine Coon-looking kitty named after the vampire slayer, reportedly had 170 followers and 20 posts when the employees viewed the data. The traumatizing tracking has reportedly forced Buffy off of social media: Cristina Criddle, the cat’s owner and a reporter for the Financial Times, said Buffy “sadly is no longer making content.”Will…

On Thursday, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew will give his first interview since sparring with House lawmakers in a testy hearing back in March. Chew is one of dozens of business leaders speaking at the TED2023 “Possibility” conference being held in Vancouver, Canada.Mourning the Loss of Addison Rae’s Debut Album | The Meme MachineChew, who has been on a weeks-long campaign to try and persuade lawmakers not to ban the app in the US, is expected to speak with speak about entrepreneurship, artificial intelligence, and society’s…

Photo: Samuel Corum (AP)U.S.government efforts to ban TikTok over national security grounds, once considered a pie-in-the-sky pipe dream, are looking more and more likely by the week, especially after Congress browbeat TikTok’s CEO for five hours last week. That said, we’ve been here before. Various players in the federal government have attempted to ban TikTok before, all unsuccessfully. In just three short months, at least four new bills have reached the House and Senate demanding, in various forms, a national ban of…

TikTok has enlisted three heavyweights from American politics and business to advise it behind the scenes as the social-media app tries to convince U.S. authorities that it isn’t beholden to the Chinese government. David Plouffe and Jim Messina, veterans of Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns, and Zenia Mucha, the former longtime communications chief of Walt Disney Co.…

Self-described libertarian, Kentucky Senator, and messy yard dispute loser Rand Paul has broken with fellow Republicans and become possibly the sole GOP voice opposing a national TikTok ban. In his view, banning TikTok would violate Americans’ right to free speech and would make vindictive US lawmakers no different from their Chinese counterparts who’ve moved to ban US social media firms like Facebook and YouTube. Paul’s recent statements come just days after House lawmakers from both parties laid into TikTok CEO Shou Zi…

In 2020, former President Donald Trump kicked off a worldwide frenzy about TikTok over the app’s potential security concerns. TikTok is now banned on government devices in the US, Canada, the UK, the EU, and elsewhere, and American lawmakers have their eyes on a national ban for consumers. The French, apparently, are the only adults in the room. As the Register first reported, France just banned all recreational apps from government phones, not just TikTok.“The government has decided to ban the downloading and installing…

The head of the US National Security Agency's cybersecurity directorate on Monday said TikTok represents a "strategic issue" rather than an immediate "tactical" threat to the United States. Speaking at a policy conference in Northern California, Rob Joyce, director of cybersecurity for the spy agency, reiterated the agency's earlier position that the Chinese-owned social networking app is akin to a "loaded gun" that the Chinese government could use to influence what information Americans see. "Why would you bring the…

Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said that the House will move forward with a proposed TikTok ban bill after the social media platform’s CEO Shou Zi Chew testified before Congress on Thursday.  “It’s very concerning that the CEO of TikTok can’t be honest and admit what we already know to be true—China has access to TikTok user data,” McCarthy wrote in a tweet on Sunday.  “The House will be moving forward with legislation to protect Americans from the technological tentacles of the Chinese Communist Party.”…

Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) on Sunday argued that a national TikTok ban would be like putting “a Band-Aid on maybe a small scab,” saying that lawmakers needed to focus on a broader data security bill. “To ban TikTok is to put a Band-Aid on maybe a small scab versus what’s happening in the whole social media landscape,” Bowman said in an interview with MSNBC’s “PoliticsNation.” “We need a national data privacy piece of legislation.” Bowman has been fighting back against a rising tide of bipartisan support for…