Why security concerns makes executive order against TikTok 'appropriate action': Fmr. Obama Admin.
President Trump has issued an executive order banning TikTok if the company is not sold in 45 days. Duff & Phelps Institute Fellow and Former Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Manufacturing and Services in the Obama Administration Nicole Lamb-Hale joins the On the Move panel to discuss.
Video Transcript
ADAM SHAPIRO: We got the news yesterday that President Trump issued executive orders banning US transactions with Chinese tech firms. That includes Tencent and ByteDance. Now, the ban will go into effect in 45 days. It will be up to Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross to identify the transactions. And those transactions would be on the apps like TikTok as well as WeChat.
There is a statement from TikTok. They said, quote, "This executive order risks undermining global businesses' trust in the United States' commitment to the rule of law which has served as a magnet for investment and spurred decades of American economic growth. And it sets a dangerous precedent for the concept of free expression and open markets."
To help us understand what is happening and where this may go, we invite into the stream Nicole Lamb-Hale, Duff & Phelps Institute Fellow, also a former Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Manufacturing and Services in the Obama administration. Good to have you here. What do you think we should pay attention to most in what is becoming an escalating war of words between the United States and China?
NICOLE LAMB-HALE: Well, thank you, Adam. It's a great question. And what we talk to our clients with the Duff & Phelps Institute about all the time is this trifecta of tensions in the US-China relationship. It's trade, it's technology, it's geopolitics. We're seeing all of that today, including with the announcement on sanctions against Hong Kong officials. And so clearly, the TikTok and WeChat actions fall into that technology tension.
And I can tell you, having served on the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States when I was in the Obama administration, data security issues were always an issue, but we didn't have the tools to address it. With the amendments to the legislation authorizing CFIUS, there is a tool to address it around privacy and protection of personally identifiable information. And so to the extent that there is a national security threat associated with TikTok and WeChat, this is appropriate action.
AKIKO FUJITA: Nicole, you know, there's a lot of attention that's been placed on TikTok but in many ways, WeChat in this executive order. Likely be a lot more disruptive, given just how many people use the app for communication with those in the mainland. A lot of US businesses do business on the WeChat app as well.
What are the tools the US government has to actually enforce this? Are we talking about Apple and Google essentially replacing the app? Are we talking about calling on individuals to remove the app from their phones? I mean, what can the Commerce Department do?
NICOLE LAMB-HALE: Well, it's a little bit of all of the above, Akiko. What is interesting here, particularly with WeChat-- it's not as well known as TikTok. It does have a lot of applications that are beyond what TikTok offers. The Commerce Department, acting under the president's authority with respect to emergency powers, can put restrictions on consumer use and business use of TikTok and WeChat.
We've already seen, with respect to the federal government employees, that there have been orders to remove the apps from their devices that are issued by the government. So there are a number of tools. I hope that the tools are identified very shortly and that this list or this restrictions-- these restrictions are so that companies can begin to plan. I mean, certainty is really the issue here, and I was a little surprised by the open-ended nature of the WeChat order in particular because there is really no clue as to what it will apply to. And for global businesses who are doing long-term planning, that's a problem.
DAN ROBERTS: Nicole, Dan Roberts here. If we just shift back to TikTok for a moment, what's interesting-- you say that due to the security concerns, the action is appropriate. Now, what a lot of people have pointed out is that this app-- you know, the reason the controversy began, obviously it's a China thing, but also it reaps so much of your personal data. I mean, that has kind of come out and been shown that the minute you sign up, it's recording all this stuff, gathering data from you.
And so people are pointing out, well, OK, if you let it get sold to a US company, well, that's no guarantee it's going to stop gathering the data on you. Of course, then it shifts to becoming a US issue and starts to get lumped in with these other companies that lawmakers are going after. And so the irony here might be that even if you force ByteDance to sell off TikTok, especially if it's to a Facebook or a Microsoft or a Google, by that 15-day or September 15 Trump deadline, well, then does it just become the next example to add to the list of-- forget China now, but now it's a data privacy concern for a US company?
NICOLE LAMB-HALE: Dan, it's a great point. And when I said that the action was appropriate, I'm assuming that the intelligence community determined that TikTok is indeed a national security threat and so that's why the action was taken. But your point is well-taken. We really do need to have a-- kind of instead of having a balkanized kind of data security-- data as privacy regime in the US-- we need to have a national standard. And there needs to be certainty as it relates even to the federal government and the US's access to data of private citizens. So it's a great point.
