TikTok’s largest audience is in the United States, with over 135.79 million users. This created a challenge for TikTok when the possibility of an American shutdown was on the table.

To continue Americans using the app, the U.S. struck a deal with TikTok’s former sole owner, ByteDance. In this proposal, the Chinese company would be allowed to keep under 20% of the company, but an American company would buy the rest.

During Joe Biden’s presidency, he passed a law to ban TikTok in the U.S. if it did not find a new owner by January 2025. However, on President Donald Trump’s first day in office, he signed an executive order to keep the app running while his administration tried to reach an agreement with the sale of the company.

Now, just over a year after his re-election, Trump’s administration has cut a deal; the U.S. now owns 80.1% of TikTok. With 45% owned by a pool of U.S.-backed investors, including Oracle, Silver Lake and MGX. The other 35% stake in TikTok is owned by eight investors, one being Dell CEO Michael Dell’s personal investment office.

“I think it could be a good thing,” Ethan Terry,  junior political science major, said. “I think giving it back to American hands could help protect our privacy in some sort as long as it’s not overseen by the government too much.”

ByteDance still owns 19.9% of the app, just under the 20% cap given to them. With the app owned across two separate continents, the TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC was created. An independent U.S.-based entity whose purpose is to manage TikTok’s American operations and data security.

Just after TikTok was bought in the U.S., users received a pop-up in the app to agree to its new terms of service and privacy policy. 

“I have never read TikTok’s privacy policy,” Kayla Geise, a freshman in early childhood education, said. “I think that when any app has the terms and conditions pop up, I immediately hit agree without reading because I assume nothing is happening.”

One in five Americans reported always or often reading through the terms of service and privacy policy, according to a study done by Pew Research. Here’s a breakdown of the biggest changes. 

•  The app can now have users’ precise location if location services are turned on for the app.
• Any user who uses the app’s AI tools will have their interaction tracked by the company.
• Users under the age of 13 will have a limited “Under 13 Experience.” 
• Users are responsible for putting AI content labels on any posted videos with AI-generated content.

Under both updated and late policies, TikTok said it may collect data such as citizenship status, identifying as transgender, mental health diagnosis, as well as a running list of other possible data collected.

 “After the ownership change, the privacy policy mentioned the current location of users’ devices. There was no option but ‘Agree.’ I read a little more into it and it mentioned being able to check citizenship or immigration status. I was very confused by this,” Laila Brito, a freshman with a business major, said.

The app will have a retrained algorithm on U.S. user data, meaning the algorithm is still licensed by ByteDance but may change how feeds in the app will look for Americans. The recommender system (TikTok’s algorithm) is what tailors short videos based on how a user interacts with the app. With the retrained algorithm, there are claims that the app could censor what viewers are seeing in the near future. 

The question remains, will the popular social media platform see a decline in users after this ownership change, or will things become even busier now that it’s in U.S. hands?