Yahoo News Mark Zuckerberg contributed to Trump's concerns over TikTok, report claims
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been lobbying president Donald Trump and other politicians, reportedly stoking their fears about Chinese viral video app TikTok’s existence in the US, according to a new report.
Zuckerberg “made the case to President Trump that the rise of Chinese internet companies threatens American business, and should be a bigger concern than reining in Facebook” in October last year, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal,
The breakup of Facebook has been a concern of US politicians in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, as well as arguments that Facebook owning Instagram and WhatsApp creates an anti-competitive ecosystem.
Zuckerberg also “discussed TikTok specifically” with a number of other US senators, the report claimed, and it was reportedly after that discussion that senators began raising concerns about its safety.
This year, both the Democratic National Committee and the Republican National Committee issued warnings to their staff about using TikTok.
A Facebook spokesperson told the Wall Street Journal that Zuckerberg could not recall discussing TikTok with Mr Trump.
Mr Trump has since issued an executive order against the viral video app, giving it until the 21st September 2020 to either be purchased by a US company – most likely Microsoft – or be banned in the US.
This is because Mr Trump believes TikTok could be used to gather data about US users and send that with the Chinese government.
TikTok has denied any allegations that it would do so, and is now suing the Trump administration over the issue.
Zuckerberg has previously spoken out against Mr Trump’s executive order, saying it would set a “bad long-term precedent”, but any harm against TikTok is likely to benefit his own properties.
Instagram recently rolled out ‘reels’, a feature similar to TikTok which that the video app has called a “copycat product”.
As well as an executive order against TikTok, Mr Trump has also signed a similar executive order against WeChat which experts have hypothesised could have severe consequences for Apple.
This is due to the number of users who would swap from Apple’s iOS platform to Google’s Android if the app was removed from their phones.
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