Donald Trump calls TikTok big threat, says ban on it will benefit Facebook

US presidential candidate Donald Trump has said that the short video app TikTok is a threat to national security. However, along with this he said that banning it will shock some children and it will benefit Meta’s social media platform Facebook. Voting on a law is to be held in the US House of Representatives on Wednesday. China’s ByteDance, which controls TikTok, will get a deadline of about six months to sell its stake in this app.

TikTok is used by approximately 17 crore people in America. This voting is being done under the rules in which two-thirds of the members need to vote in agreement to pass any subject. A conference can be held behind closed doors to brief the members of the House of Representatives on behalf of America’s Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Justice Department and Office of the Director of National Intelligence. FBI Director Chris Wray reiterated his concerns about TikTok in a hearing on Monday.

Regarding this, it has been said in the annual threat assessment of the Intelligence Community in America, “Candidates of both political parties were targeted in the mid-term elections held in America two years ago by the TikTok accounts of a Chinese propaganda firm.” Apart from this, the Justice Department had given information about security related apprehensions regarding TikTok in a document last week.

Trump said, “I don’t want to double the size of Facebook. If TikTok is banned, it will be of great benefit to Facebook and others. I believe that Facebook has been very dishonest.” Recently, Trump had a meeting with Jeff Yass of Susquehanna International Group, which has a stake in ByteDance. However, Trump said that they did not talk about TikTok. Earlier, Trump had criticized Facebook and Instagram for removing his posts during the riots in America three years ago. However, Trump’s social media accounts were restored last year.