For TikTok, time may be running out

From Politico’s Morning Cybersecurity:

Show me the money — More recently, TikTok has tried to defuse the D.C. trust deficit by arguing the best way to prevent Chinese spying or propaganda isn’t a ban or a forced sale. It’s the company’s $1.5 billion plan to build a wall between the U.S. subsidiary and its Chinese owners.

Known as Project Texas, the initiative would see TikTok hire an army of 2,500 employees to review the firm’s content moderation policies. The firm would also tap Oracle to help establish “gateways” that safeguard Americans’ data from the prying eyes of Beijing.

But so long as there is “a direct or perceived connection to the Chinese Communist Party,” building a maze of corporate safeguards may never be enough to sway U.S. lawmakers, Brandon Pugh, policy director of the R Street Institute’s Cybersecurity and Emerging Threats, told MC over email.