August 12--According to a Bloomberg report on August 11, the Trump administration has lifted restrictions on the use of TikTok on federal government equipment on the grounds that TikTok no longer poses a so-called "national security threat" after its U.S. business has been restructured ".

Photograph: Archives of Hong Kong China News Service

According to Observer.com, a memo issued by the White House Office of Management and Budget on Monday (10th) revoked a 2023 directive. The directive previously banned the use of Douyin on government equipment, citing the alleged security risk of China's possession of Douyin at the time.

The memo comes after the U.S. Department of Justice released a written opinion last month finding that TikTok no longer meets the definition of a "regulated app" under a law passed in 2022 that previously barred TikTok from being used on federal platforms.

In January of this year, TikTok announced the establishment of TikTok USDS joint venture limited liability company. The joint venture will be responsible for TikTok's data protection, algorithm security, content auditing and software protection in the United States.

According to previous media reports, byte beat will continue to retain the intellectual property rights of the TikTok algorithm and authorize the joint venture to use the algorithm. The announcement also mentioned that TikTok USA will be responsible for e-commerce, advertising, marketing and other commercial activities, as well as the interconnection of TikTok's global products. It is reported that the company is entirely owned by byte beat.

These commercial partnerships mean that TikTok's solution in the United States is officially online, allowing more than 0.2 billion U.S. users to continue using TikTok. In addition, according to the announcement, the company structure and business segments show that TikTok's solution in the United States is very similar to Apple's "Cloud Guizhou" business in China.

In September last year, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said on issues related to Douyin that China's position on Douyin was clear. The Chinese government respects the wishes of enterprises and welcomes enterprises to conduct commercial negotiations in accordance with market rules and reach solutions that comply with Chinese laws and regulations and balance interests. He hopes that the US side will provide an open, fair and non-discriminatory business environment for Chinese enterprises to invest in the United States.