Recently, Tiktok's capital, Capital, funded in the U.S. Congress hearing, accepting information security inquiries, which has attracted the attention of countries around the world.In the context of increasingly tight relations in the United States and China, it is easy for people to worsen this matter with the relationship between the two countries.But in fact, in addition to the international and political factors, the incident reflects the impact of multinational forces generated by science and technology on national sovereignty.Therefore, it is not only a Chinese background technology giant that will face such regulatory challenges in the United States. Any technology -based multinational enterprises may encounter similar problems in any country, and this game has just begun.The future development of the TIKTOK incident still has great uncertainty. The direction of the incident will not only affect US -China relations, but also affect the existence of other technology giants in the United States.

The game of technology and sovereignty

It is easy for people to accept Tiktok in the U.S. Congress and imagine the result of deterioration of Sino -US relations, but in fact, this is not the first time that technology giants have accepted such questions.As early as 2018, Zuckerberg, the president of Facebook, who started the American social media giant, accepted nearly a hundred U.S. members for a total of 10 hours of torture, and the problem was mainly focused on data control.One year later, Facebook agreed to pay a $ 5 billion fine to resolve the US Federal Trade Commission's investigation of privacy for many years.In addition, in 2020, the four major U.S. technology giants Apple, Google, Amazon, and Facebook presidents attended the United States Congress for the first time. The members of the Council were inquiring fiercely about monopoly, unfair competition, and technical security.

This shows that Tiktok is not the first technology company to accept the US Congress or the last one.The US official investigation of technology companies is not completely targeted at companies from foreign countries, and local technology companies are also key investigations.Behind this actually reflects the struggle between the sovereign state government and the multinational science and technology giants.

In the traditional society, the information and data collection and protection of citizens of a country are mainly the responsibilities of the government within the scope of national sovereignty.For many data, these entities may break through national boundaries on the Internet and expand influence and control to other countries.

On the one hand, these multinational companies themselves are the products of globalization. With the growth of the enterprise, local colors will become lighter; on the other hand, their operations in a country still need to abide by the laws and laws of the country and their countries.Accept government supervision.From the perspective of government level, due to the rapid development of high -tech technology, the government is worried that the behemoths in these business community will become so large that they will become unprepared and erode the power of sovereign countries.

In addition to the United States, the Chinese government has also increased the control of local science and technology giants in recent years.Due to data security issues, the Chinese government issued huge tickets on Titer's taxi giants, and Internet companies such as Alibaba and Tencent were also punished by government antitrust.Recently, the Chinese government has also established a new national data bureau to strengthen data resource management.In some countries, the government's supervision of the technology network platform also has a stricter trend.

The game between the sovereign state and the multinational scientific and technological power will continue. Although the government can strengthen control or even ban on some specific platforms, it will also face considerable difficulties and resistance throughout the process.

Disable Tiktok's resistance is not small

Although some members of the hearing said at the hearing that Tiktok should be disabled in the United States, it is necessary to face great resistance.First of all, although the U.S. government suspects that Tiktok may provide US user data to the Chinese government, there is no direct evidence to prove this.The US judicial emphasizes innocence. The company itself does not need to provide evidence to prove that it is innocent, but the prosecution must provide clear evidence to prove the fault of Tiktok.

Secondly, the number of TIKTOK in the United States is as many as 150 million people. Many active users rely on the TIKTOK platform to make a living.Politics has great influence.This will undoubtedly affect the votes of members in this constituency and even the presidential election next year.It is not easy for politicians to overcome such a large political resistance.

In addition, because Tiktok can be regarded as a social media, it is forbidden to face questions that may face the first amendment to the US Constitution.The first amendment guarantees the right to speech of citizens, and the supporters of TIKTOK can conduct a constitutional investigation on the blockade.Since the United States is a democratic government and the implementation of the three powers of administrative, legislative and judicial institutions, the relevant administrative, legislative and judicial lawsuits may be protracted.

When Trump was the president of the United States, he had prohibited the two applications of downloading or updating the United States online app store on the grounds of WEChat and Tiktok threatened the national security.The court decided to suspend the execution of the ban.After Biden came to power, the administrative ban was directly canceled.Even if the current Biden government has changed attitudes, in order to re -implement the ban, it also faces a lot of resistance.

At present, in addition to TIKTOK, the popular American applications also include e -commerce platform TEMU, Shein, etc., which are also related to mainland China.If you have to ban these platforms because of political factors, it will not only affect the shopping needs and daily life of many American people, but also affect the reputation of the United States as a benchmark as a global market economy.If Tiktok is disabled in the United States, the market share is likely to be divided by competitors such as YouTube, Instagram, and Snapchat.Therefore, the ban may affect the investment confidence of other multinational companies in the United States.

How to handle the Tiktok incident in the United States deserves further attention. This is not only related to the relationship between the United States and China, but also has a far -reaching impact on the increasingly subtle relations between the government and technology companies.

The author is a senior researcher and assistant director of the East Asia Research Institute of Singapore.