The fate of TikTok has continuously been questioned over the last few years. The Biden administration took the first steps in the crackdown back in 2021, the Trump administration amping it up over these last few months after he was re-elected.

Recently White House press secretary Caroline Leavitt went on Fox News to let the public know of a new deal that had been reached on the future of TikTok : “This means TikTok will be majority owned by Americans in the United States…the data and privacy will be lead by one of America’s greatest tech companies Oracle and the algorithm will also be controlled by America as well.”

It’s official, TikTok has been sold, and the current TikTok will no longer exist; we will be given a brand new app made for Americans. I wouldn’t have a problem with this if what they were actually trying to do was protect Americans’ data, but it’s simply not the case.

They have switched up so much. First, the app was going to get banned, then they wanted to sell TikTok to an American company and now they want a completely different app controlled by America. So what is it that you really want?

Oracle, which is the tech company that will be in charge of our data and privacy; was in a scandal as recently as last year when a lawsuit was filed against them by the state of California, according to Matthew Broersma from Silicon UK, “The plaintiffs said Oracle’s dossiers included what people viewed online, where they accessed banking services, purchased petrol, what restaurants they dined in and where they used their credit cards.” They then allegedly sold said data to marketers and later settled when the company agreed to pay $115 million.

This whole idea that TikTok is unsafe for Americans is a bunch of lies. The administration saw the amount of money the app was making, the right to free speech being expressed on the platform, and decided to do something about it. Why say you wish to protect Americans’ data when you also choose to partner with a company like Oracle?

Does that look like the right company to handle our information? What’s so bad about TikTok stealing our data when American companies continue to do it every day? This administration wants to control the algorithm and block out anything they don’t want Americans to see. The charm and uniqueness of the app is going to be completely stripped away, and we will be given a trash low-quality app that will do nothing but silence those who speak and target those who disagree.