By THEO BJORNSTAD
TikTok, after first going dark on Jan. 18 this year, has been under a great degree of scrutiny. After a turbulent few months of congressional investigation, legal maneuvering, and closely working with the Trump administration, it seems increasingly likely that the deal meant to bring ownership of the app, and its data storage operations to U.S. soil will soon bear fruit.
As per the administration, it seems that the three-way talks between them, the Chinese government, and ByteDance, the app’s current owners, have been progressing steadily, and now the conversation seems to have shifted from, “will it come over?” to “who will own it once it does?” Many people and businesses have expressed interest in having a stake in the app once it’s put up for ownership, including tech mogul Elon Musk, Jimmy Donaldson, better known as MrBeast, and Microsoft, but with only speculation to go off of, the question of who might own it, or if anyone could own it, has been too murky to answer. That was until just a few days ago when the president made a few comments on the deal’s progress.
According to President Trump in an interview with Fox News, Lachlan Murdoch, son of Rupert Murdoch and heir to his father’s media empire, alongside (briefly) world’s richest man and Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, as well as Michael Dell, CEO of Dell Technologies, are jointly at the helm of the deal to bring TikTok and its algorithm stateside. While it has been under de jure ban since ByteDance failed to meet the deadline to divest set by the “Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act” (PAFACA), the ban has yet to be enforced, although the threat alone seems to have been enough to bring ByteDance to the bargaining table. The new system of ownership, if TikTok were to move abroad at this time, seems to take the form of a jointly managed corporation, with multiple members combining their shares to form a governing body over the app.
However, the deal is not without controversy. The list of parties purported by the president to be at the forefront of the operation has thus far consisted of some of his most fervent supporters. Fox Corp, owners of Fox News and the Wall Street Journal, has acted as the nation’s premier source for conservative-aligned media coverage, playing a major role in the president’s election both in 2016 and earlier this year. Additionally, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison has not only maintained strong financial ties with the Republican Party, donating several million dollars to many conservative PACs over the years, but a close personal relationship with President Trump. The two men appear to be good friends, with Ellison seen dining with him at his Mar-a-Lago resort in 2024, as per the New York Times, and making numerous appearances in the Oval Office in the months since his return to Washington. And while Dell’s ties to the president are the weakest of the three, its involvement remains consistent with the tech industry’s recent attempts at courting favor from the administration in hopes for additional investment, such as the government’s recent purchase of 10% of Intel Technologies, domestic chipmaker, and longtime component supplier for Dell.
Critics of the deal, citing the strong political and financial efforts of the parties involved to place the president in power, have rebuked the deal as blatantly quid pro quo, with TikTok, and the fortune of user data it is said to possess, acting as a multi-billion dollar reward to the parties involved for their part in platforming and aiding the President during his campaign. Proponents of the buyout plan, however, have noted the decentralized control of the app the buyout would grant, and that moving operations to the U.S. would help to bolster standards of accountability regarding how user data collected on the app is used and processed.
However, as it stands, it seems that the plan to bring TikTok stateside is moving at a significantly faster pace. What this means for the ownership of current users’ data is unknown, but it may not be much longer before the app’s current owners are given an ultimatum.
Featured image: Betty Cavicchia’28
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