Trump said the move has to do with “credible evidence” that ByteDance “might take action that threatens to impair the national security of the United States,”ByteDance, which bought the app Musical.ly and merged it with TikTok in 2017, was already under heavy pressure to divest from its U.S. operations. Last week, Trump issued an executive order that would prohibit Americans and U.S.
companies from doing certain transactions with TikTok. This new order comes after “Cfius conducted an exhaustive review of the case and unanimously recommended this action to the president in order to protect U.S. users from exploitation of their personal data,” Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said. Mnuchin added that a divestment would also have to include “any data obtained or derived from TikTok or Musical.ly users in the United States.