[tik tok app, photo credit: Pixabay]

Joe Biden has officially signed a law that would ban Chinese affiliated apps unless they are sold within a year.

Just this Wednesday, President Biden affirmed that Chinese related apps such as TikTok will be banned unless the technology is sold to an American company.

This is of utmost importance to the millions of American users and the video streaming apps’ future.

To many, this is seen as “intensifying America’s tech war with China.”

However, it is foreseen that the law won’t have immediate effects or disrupt TikTok as legal challenges and various hurdles to selling the app will delay any issues for months.

The Chinese company ByteDance, in 2017, purchased the dancing karaoke app “Muscial.ly” and later relaunched the app officially as TikTok.

However, after the new release and its booming popularity, the app was under heavy surveillance by national security officials in Washington fearing Chinese government influence.

Still, TikTok was able to gain massive popularity among not only Chinese but U.S citizens despite concerns of Washington officials, according to Pew Research Center.

TikTok became the global trendsetter of short-length videos and was used by 170 million Americans.

U.S officials became worried about the influence of TikTok as it was where one third of users got their latest news and current events.

This was looked at unfavorably as U.S officials worried that the Chinese government may try to influence the news on TikTok.

Lawmakers and the Biden Administration argue that as long as a Chinese company owns TikTok it remains under the control of the Chinese government.

"Congress is not acting to punish ByteDance, TikTok or any other individual company," said Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell

Instead, she states that "Congress is acting to prevent foreign adversaries from conducting espionage, surveillance, maligned operations, harming vulnerable Americans, our servicemen and women, and our U.S. government personnel."

The owner of TikTok responded that he is confident that TikTok would win in court, adding that users don’t have anything to worry about.

"Rest assured, we aren't going anywhere," Shou Zi Chew (CEO of TikTok). "The facts and the Constitution are on our side and we expect to prevail again."

The Biden Administration stated: If the app is not sold in the span of a year, the law will make it illegal for web services to support TikTok which would force Google and the Apple App Store to remove Tik Tok.

The banning of TikTok is the first time the U.S has passed a law that would forcefully take down a social media platform.

Unsurprisingly, TikTok has promised users that it will take the Biden administration to court, claiming that “the law would suppress the free speech of millions of Americans.”

This argument was supported by Kate Ruane who runs the Center for Democracy and Technology’s Free Expression Project saying “the TikTok ban law is unconstitutional and a blow to free expression in the U.S.”

Ruane further states that "Congress shouldn't be in the business of banning platforms, they should be working to enact comprehensive privacy legislation that protects our private data no matter where we choose to engage online."