Intimidation Tactics.  Housed within the Aid funding Bill passed in Congress were two less advertised agendas:   1.  Tik Tok's Chinese founders are now required to sell their interest in the company to an American investor approved by Congress – within six months.    2.  Frozen Russian assets will earn interest (at an undisclosed rate) which will be used to fund Ukraine's reconstruction after the war.

Legally, both of these Governmental Acts are contestable and unConstitutional, but the fact that our government would even consider them as justifiable is 'insane'.   Despite these 535 Lawyers in Congress attesting that any of this is remotely legal, they gleefully celebrate their win!   The easy remedy for the Tik Tok debacle would be to refuse the sale – allow the ban – destroy Tik Tok and create Tok Tik.  Given that Tik Tok would now be banned in the US – the suffering would revert to those holding majority shares, ie global investors holding 60% of the shares – but NOT the technology which is held by the two founders who own just 20%.

An additional 20% of Tik Tok is owned by its employees including 7,000 Americans.  Exactly who does Congress believe will suffer from this Extortion?  The US represents the largest base of users at 170 million.   China has -0- users.  If the founders simply allow the US Ban – the shareholders will suffer and 7,000 American employees will lose their jobs and share value.

Why does our Government want the Extortion?  

On the surface, the spin is:  "lawmakers fear that the Chinese government could use security laws to force ByteDance to hand over data about TikTok's 170 million US users."  TikTok tracks which videos users engage with and how long they do so. The privacy policy also enables the app to track the contents of direct messages, as well as your country location, internet address, and device type – violating personal privacy…

So the same US Government that tracks every social media app, surveils Americans without their knowledge, and uses the data to extort Americans, is afraid China will track Tik Tok users?  No.   They want the algorithm created by the founders.   And they are willing to pay $100 billion for that and future profits.