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Montana lawmakers gave the final floor on Friday to a bill that would ban the social media app TikTok from operating in the state, a move that will face legal challenges but also become a testing ground for a TikTok-free America, many lawmakers across the country are worried about. . potential Chinese spying.
The state House voted 54-43 for the measure, which will make Montana the first state with a total ban on the app. It’s more than the bans that have been implemented in almost half of the states – including Montana itself – and the US federal government that has banned TikTok on government devices.
The measure now goes to Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte, who declined to say Friday that he plans to sign it into law.
A statement issued by spokeswoman Brooke Metrione said the governor “will carefully consider” all bills sent by the Legislature to his desk. Gianforte banned TikTok from state government devices last year, saying the app posed a “significant risk” to sensitive state data.
TikTok spokeswoman Brooke Oberwetter promised a legal challenge to the constitutionality of the measure, saying the bill’s supporters “have admitted they have no viable plan” to implement “this effort to censor America’s voice.”
The company “will continue to fight against TikTok users and creators in Montana whose livelihoods and First Amendment rights are threatened by this egregious government overreach,” Oberwetter said.
Security concerns
TikTok, which is owned by Chinese tech company ByteDance, has come under intense scrutiny over concerns it could hand over user data to the Chinese government or push pro-Beijing propaganda and misinformation on its platform.
Leaders at the FBI, CIA and many lawmakers from both parties have raised these concerns but have offered no evidence that this is the case.
Proponents of the ban point to two Chinese laws that force companies in the country to cooperate with the government on state intelligence work. He also cited troubling episodes such as the disclosure by ByteDance in December that it fired four employees who accessed the IP addresses and other data of two journalists while trying to find the source of a leaked report about the company.
The U.S. Congress is considering legislation that does not specifically target TikTok but gives the U.S. Department of Commerce broader powers to limit foreign threats to the technology platform.
The bill is supported by the White House, but has received pushback from privacy advocates, right-wing commentators and others who say the language is expansive.
TikTok says it has plans to protect its US users’ data.
‘A critical step,’ said the MP
Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen, whose office creates the state’s legislation, said in a social media post Friday that the bill “is a critical step to ensure that we protect the privacy of Montanans,” though he acknowledged a court battle.
The measure will ban TikTok downloads in the country and will fine any “entity” – the app store or TikTok – $10,000 US per day for each person “offered the ability” to access or download the app. There will be no penalty for the user.
The ban will not take effect until January 2024 and will become invalid if Congress passes a national measure or if TikTok cuts ties with China.
The bill was introduced in February, just weeks after the Chinese spy balloon flew over Montana, but it was drafted earlier.
A representative from tech trade group TechNet told state lawmakers that app stores don’t have the ability to manage apps on a state-by-state basis, so Apple’s App Store and Google Play Store can’t enforce the law.
Ashley Sutton, executive director of TechNet for the state of Washington and the northwest, said there that “the responsibility should be on the app to determine where it can operate, not the app store.”
Knudsen, the attorney general of Montana, has said that apps for online gambling can be disabled in countries that do not allow it, so they should work for TikTok.
TikTok is also under pressure in other parts of the West – including in Canada.
In February, Canada’s federal privacy regulator and three provincial partners announced a joint investigation into TikTok, including whether its policies comply with Canadian privacy laws.
That same month, Canada’s federal government said it would block and remove the platform from all government devices, citing security concerns. Prohibition of provincial government tools and regional government tools has been implemented.
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