When Shou Zi Chew, the CEO of TikTok, appeared before the US Congress last week, he was interrogated about almost every aspect of the video-sharing company, from its links with the Chinese government to its impact on teenage depression. During the five-hour questioning, there was one topic that was barely mentioned: who actually owns TikTok?
Listening to the congressional questions, you might presume that the company is entirely Chinese, since TikTok’s parent group ByteDance was founded by Zhang Yiming, a Chinese internet entrepreneur. A bill in Congress seeking to block the app in the US — government employees in some states are already barred from installing it on government-issued devices — is premised on the notion that the company is under Beijing’s control.
Shou, who is Singaporean, denies this. “ByteDance is not owned or controlled by the Chinese government,” he insisted during the hearings. But the White House has urged ByteDance to sell TikTok if it wants to keep operating in the US.