White House Discloses Who Will Manage TikTok Algorithm In Deal

A proposed divestment deal for TikTok’s U.S. operations from its Chinese owner ByteDance is on the cusp of being finalized.

The deal will give management of the app’s algorithm to tech giant Oracle.

Under the deal, TikTok’s U.S. operations will be transferred to an investor consortium, comprising Oracle, Silver Lake, and Andreessen Horowitz.

According to the Associated Press, a Trump administration official said they believe the deal will satisfy national security concerns.

ByteDance will retain a less than 20% stake.

TikTok’s algorithm will be secured by Oracle under the US buyout.

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More from the Associated Press:

American officials have previously warned the algorithm that fuels what users see on the app is vulnerable to manipulation by Chinese authorities, who can use it to shape content on the platform in a way that’s difficult to detect.

“It wouldn’t be in compliance if the algorithm is Chinese. There can’t be any shared algorithm with ByteDance,” said a spokesperson for the House Select Committee on China.

Oracle would receive a copy of the algorithm and oversee the app’s security operations. The algorithm would be “fully inspected” and monitored for any abnormal behavior, the senior White House official said Monday.

In a call with reporters, the official later emphasized that the content recommendation formula would be retrained using U.S. data in order to make sure the system is “behaving appropriately.” It is currently unclear if retraining the copy of the algorithm would essentially create a separate TikTok experience just for domestic U.S. users, but White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt claimed in a Monday press briefing that “TikTok users in the U.S will be able to see videos posted by users in other countries and vice versa.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said President Trump will sign the deal later this week.

“In partnership with the U.S. government, Oracle will serve as TikTok’s trusted security provider, and they will independently monitor the safety and data security of all U.S. user data on TikTok’s platform,” Leavitt said.

“All U.S. user data will be stored on servers operated by Oracle in the United States,” she added.

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CNN provided further info:

Trump is set to sign an executive order later this week stating that the deal constitutes a qualified divestiture as required by the ban-or-sale law that passed last year, the official said. He will also extend the pause on enforcing the law by another 120 days so that paperwork and regulatory approvals for the deal can be completed. At the same time, the official said, ByteDance is expected to sign an agreement laying out the framework of the deal with one or more of the new investors.

Trump last week extended the ban until December 16, meaning the deal is likely to be formally completed early next year. That would conclude the yearslong effort to place TikTok under American control, over US officials’ concern that its China-based parent company posed a national security risk.

The fate of the algorithm had remained a major question, because the content recommendation engine plays a big role in the app’s popularity but is also behind the national security concerns. US officials worried that ByteDance could be forced to manipulate the algorithm on behalf of the Chinese government to influence or generate dissent among Americans. The TikTok ban-or-sale law prohibits “any cooperation with respect to the operation of a content recommendation algorithm” between ByteDance and a new potential American ownership group.

Under the deal, the new ownership group will receive a copy of the algorithm code from ByteDance, review it and retrain it on US user data. Oracle will continuously monitor how it’s pushing content to users, according to the senior White House official.

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