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ByteDance’s Big US Reboot

ByteDance’s Big US Reboot

Plus: Prompt & pro tip to stay private, and three fresh AI tools.

Roko's Basilisk
July 08, 2025

Here’s what’s on our plate today:

🎬 TikTok’s “clean” U-S reboot—why ByteDance thinks a new app saves the day.
🗳️ Download instantly, wait it out, or ignore the hype?
💬 Prompt + pro-privacy tip to keep your content flowing minus the tracking.
🛠️ Try these three just-dropped AI tools.

Let’s dive in. No floaties needed…

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The Laboratory

Can TikTok’s new app save its U.S. presence?

TikTok has been valued at well over $100 billion, with potential buyers reportedly willing to spend between $40 billion and $50 billion to acquire its U.S. operations. The popular social media platform for creating, sharing, and discovering short-form videos has about 115 million monthly mobile users in the U.S., which is slightly behind Instagram’s 131 million, according to an estimate by market intelligence firm Sensor Tower. This puts the app ahead of rival platforms like Snapchat, Pinterest, and Reddit.

What makes the platform so addictive is AI-driven algorithmic personalization. The platform uses a two-pronged approach to ensure it remains on top of its game. These include curating a personalized "For You Page" to maintain user engagement and boost influencers’ visibility, rewarding them for creating popular content. To achieve these motives, the platform relies on a self-training AI engine, content tags, and maintaining user profiles and scenarios. A lot of studies have been conducted to understand how TikTok uses these in tandem; however, how the platform’s core algorithm works continues to be shrouded in mystery.

The secrecy around TikTok’s algorithm stems from its central importance to ByteDance’s business strategy, so crucial that ByteDance prefers shutting down the app and overselling it. TikTok's recommendation algorithm was also in large part taken from its Chinese sister app Douyin, which was released in 2016.

And it is this technology that lies at the heart of TikTok’s troubles in the U.S.

A history of controversy and conflict

The first challenge to TikTok in the U.S. came in 2020 when the first Trump administration attempted to use its power to block the application. At the time, the administration invoked alleged efforts by foreign telecommunications companies to conduct economic and industrial espionage against the United States as the reason for the ban.

ByteDance responded by calling the executive order a means for Trump to further his alleged "broader campaign of anti-China rhetoric" ahead of the presidential election, which Trump lost.

However, after failing to secure legal protection, the platform moved the data of its U.S.-based users in hopes of swaying Congress against a complete ban.

In March 2023, the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice launched an investigation into allegations that TikTok spied on American journalists. The following year, the U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation requiring ByteDance to sell TikTok or be banned in U.S. app stores and websites. It then moved to the Senate, where it was never voted on. By December 2024, ByteDance lost the legal battle it waged to stop the law, alleging it was unconstitutional.

In January 2025, after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the federal law that would ban TikTok, ByteDance was forced to shut off service for U.S. users, who were met with a message in the app stating, "A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the U.S. Unfortunately that means you can't use TikTok right now." The app was also removed from app stores.

Since then, the app’s continued operation has depended on temporary delays provided by executive orders from the Trump administration.

National security: The core of the issue

The United States wants to ban the application for several reasons, but mainly due to national security concerns. U.S. lawmakers are concerned that ByteDance might leak U.S. user data to the Chinese government if forced to.

Lawmakers have also cited addiction, misinformation, mental health concerns, and commercial exploitation of user data as reasons behind the push for a ban. However, at the heart of the ban is the difference between the content shared by the app in China and the rest of the world.

According to reports, the sister app for TikTok, Douyin, pushes out a curated stream of videos promoting patriotism, social cohesion, and personal aspirations, while TikTok pushes hyper-sexualized content aimed at driving engagement. And while ByteDance says they are different apps, sources with direct knowledge of the matter said the two algorithms remain similar to this day.

Will a new app solve TikTok’s problems?

According to a report from the Information, the Trump administration is close to working out a sale to a group of “non-Chinese” investors, including Oracle, with the current majority owner, ByteDance, maintaining a minority stake. The app is expected to be released around the time the third extension for the deadline of the ban takes effect.

The report added that TikTok users will eventually have to download the new app to be able to continue using the service, although the existing app will work until March of next year. The new app might ensure the platform continues to operate in the U.S.; however, what changes will it have to make to the algorithm, the content, the engagement strategy, and how ByteDance will get the Chinese government to sign off on the deal remains to be seen.

Whether the new app addresses concerns regarding addiction, hyper-sexualized content, and mental health depends on how negotiations between the U.S. and China unfold amid their ongoing race for global tech dominance. For millions of TikTok users, influencers, and businesses, the outcome will shape digital culture, impact livelihoods, and signal the future trajectory of global tech policy.

Ultimately, the resolution could set precedents influencing internet governance, privacy standards, and cultural exchange for years to come.

Roko Pro Tip

💡 Before any shiny new social app hits your phone, jump into Settings —> Privacy —> Tracking and toggle off default ad IDs first. Do it once, avoid a lifetime of creepy cross-app targeting.

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