Senator Ed Markey calls for investigation of TikTok joint venture amid national security concerns

WASHINGTON, DC: Democratic Senator Ed Markey on Friday, January 23, called on Congress to investigate a newly finalized deal restructuring TikTok’s US operations, saying critical details remained unanswered.

The agreement, announced on Thursday, created a majority American-owned joint venture designed to comply with a federal law aimed at addressing national security concerns tied to the app’s Chinese ownership.

TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, said that the deal would protect US user data and keep the platform available to Americans. However, lawmakers raised questions about whether the arrangement met the legal and security standards set by Congress.

Ed Markey raises transparency concerns over TikTok agreement

Markey said the Biden-era law requiring TikTok’s divestment was intended to ensure a clean break from Chinese influence, and he argued that the current deal did not demonstrate that outcome.

“The White House has provided virtually no details about this agreement, including whether TikTok’s algorithm is truly free of Chinese influence. This lack of transparency reeks,” Markey said.

“Congress has a responsibility to investigate this deal, demand transparency, and ensure that any arrangement truly protects national security while keeping TikTok online,” he stated.

A year after the federal statute mandating a nationwide ban effectively took effect, TikTok announced the formation of a new US-based entity to bring the company into compliance.

Under the agreement, a joint venture made up mostly of US-based investors would take over TikTok’s American operations.

TikTok said that the venture would operate with “defined safeguards that protect national security through comprehensive data protections, algorithm security, content moderation, and software assurances for US users.”

A White House official confirmed that both the US and Chinese governments signed off on the transaction. Still, Markey and other lawmakers said the lack of publicly available information made it difficult to assess whether the deal satisfied the statute’s intent.

Lawmakers weigh compliance with divestment law and security goals

Although the Supreme Court unanimously upheld the statute, President Donald Trump repeatedly issued executive orders directing the Justice Department not to penalize companies hosting TikTok, allowing the app to remain accessible while negotiations continued.

Under the new structure, TikTok said that its US operators would “retrain, test, and update” the app’s recommendation algorithm using American user data, while Oracle would “review and validate source code on an ongoing basis.”

TikTok also confirmed that the US version of the app would remain interoperable with the global platform, allowing American users to view content from abroad.

Lawmakers, however, remained skeptical. Rep John Moolenaar of Michigan, chair of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, said his panel planned on holding a public hearing in the coming months.

“One is: Does it make sure that the CCP does not have influence over the algorithm? And the other is: Can we assure Americans that their data is secure?” Moolenaar said, adding that “most of us are not knowledgeable about the internal workings of that deal.”