- India restrict Pakistan to 105-8 in Women's T20 World Cup
- England target repeat of Pakistan Test whitewash
- Penrith Panthers win fourth straight NRL title after downing Storm
- Weary Sinner happy for day off after battling into Shanghai last 16
- Pakistan's Masood warns England still a force without Stokes
- Madrid's Carvajal to miss several months after serious knee injury
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- Sabalenka targets world number one and Wuhan hat-trick
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- Retegui hat-trick fires five-star Atalanta to hammering of Genoa
- Heavyweights Australia, England off to World Cup winning starts
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- Man City sink Fulham to get title bid back on track
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Bill to ban TikTok in US clears Congress
The US Senate on Tuesday approved legislation requiring the wildly popular social media app TikTok to be divested from its Chinese parent company ByteDance or be shut out of the American market.
The measure was part of a $95 billion foreign aid package, including military assistance to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, which has now cleared Congress and heads to President Joe Biden's desk.
US and other Western officials have voiced alarm over the popularity of TikTok with young people, alleging it allows Beijing to collect data and spy on users. It has 170 million users in the United States alone.
These critics also say TikTok is subservient to Beijing and a conduit to spread propaganda. China and the company strongly deny these claims.
Biden has stated he will sign the legislation.
He reiterated his concerns about TikTok in a rare telephone conversation with Chinese President Xi Jinping early this month.
TikTok complained after Saturday's House vote, saying it was "unfortunate" that lawmakers sought to "jam through a ban bill that would trample the free speech rights of 170 million Americans, devastate seven million businesses, and shutter a platform that contributes $24 billion to the US economy, annually."
Under the bill, ByteDance would have to sell the app within a year or be excluded from Apple and Google's app stores in the United States.
Steven Mnuchin, who served as US treasury secretary under Biden's predecessor Donald Trump, has said he is interested in acquiring TikTok and has assembled a group of investors.
TikTok for years has been in the crosshairs of American authorities, who say the platform allows Beijing to snoop on users in the United States. But a ban could trigger lawsuits.
The bill passed by Congress gives the US president the authority to designate other applications as a threat to national security if they are controlled by a country deemed hostile.
Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of X, formerly Twitter, came out Friday against banning TikTok, saying "doing so would be contrary to freedom of speech and expression."
A.P.Maia--PC