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US Senator urges TikTok’s acquisition of Musical.ly needs security review

WASHINGTON: Senator Marco Rubio has argued TikTok was used by the Chinese government to censor politically sensitive content.

Rubio, in a letter to Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, asked a U.S. national security panel to review TikTok owner Beijing ByteDance Technology’s acquisition of Musical.ly, which is former name of the music and video sharing app.

“Chinese-owned apps are increasingly being used to censor content and silence open discussion on topics deemed sensitive by the Chinese Government and Communist Party,” the Senator said.

“There was growing evidence that TikTok in the United States was censoring content that is “not in line” with the Chinese government.,” he said, adding that China is using these apps to advance their foreign policy and globally suppress freedom of speech, expression, and other freedoms that we as Americans so deeply cherish.

ByteDance bought Musical.ly for nearly $1 billion in December 2017. It later shuttered Musical.ly and moved users to a revamped version of its own TikTok app, which serves non-Chinese markets.

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M M Alam

M. M. Alam is a Pakistan-based working journalist since 1981. Karachi University faculty gold medalist Alam began his career four decades ago by writing for Dawn, Pakistan’s highest circulating English daily. He has worked for region’s leading publications, global aviation periodicals including Rotors (of USA) and vetted New York Times as permanent employee of daily Express Tribune. Alam regularly covers international aviation and defense-related events including Salon Du Bourget (France), Farnborough (United Kingdom), Dubai (UAE). Alam has reported thousands of events and interviewed hundreds of people in Pakistan, UAE, EU, UK and USA. Being Francophone Alam also coordinates with a number of French publications.