But questions remain unresolved about how this will play out and what it means for American users.
- Is there actually a deal? -
Any sale of TikTok's US operations would require Chinese owner ByteDance to divest. That would need approval from China's government, which is reluctant to see a national champion forced out of its largest market as a trade war rages with an increasingly protectionist Trump.
While the Trump administration has insisted that China has accepted a deal for the sale, there has been no confirmation from Beijing. Queries to TikTok and ByteDance have gone unanswered.
"This deal is still very confusing in terms of what is exactly going on," University of Florida media professor Andrew Selepak told AFP.
- Is Trump taking over TikTok? -
In an executive order signed on Thursday, the White House outlined a deal centered on key investors with close ties to the president.
Trump has specifically named Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, a longtime ally and the world's second-richest man, as a major player in the arrangement. For decades, Ellison has been one of Silicon Valley's few high-profile Republicans in a tech sector dominated by liberal politics.
Ellison is returning to the spotlight through his dealings with Trump, who has brought his old friend into major AI partnerships with OpenAI, for example.
The 81-year-old has also backed his son David's acquisition of Hollywood studio Paramount and is reportedly eyeing Warner Brothers.
The investor group also includes 94-year-old media mogul Rupert Murdoch and his son Lachlan, who control Fox News.
Whether this signals a conservative rebranding of TikTok -- a platform Trump credits with helping him reach young voters -- remains unclear. Trump denied this possibility on Thursday.
The prospect of a right-wing shift, or increased government intervention in media, has raised concerns that key platforms are falling under conservative control, potentially limiting diverse viewpoints in a bitterly divided America.
The fate of TikTok will be decided amid major shifts across social media platforms.
Elon Musk has transformed X (formerly Twitter) into a vehicle for far-right politics, driving away many establishment media outlets and liberal users.
Meanwhile, Meta's Mark Zuckerberg has aligned with Trump and overhauled content moderation on Facebook and Instagram to address Republican claims of anti-conservative bias.
- Why so cheap? -
At Thursday's White House ceremony, Vice President JD Vance pegged the deal at $14 billion. That's a surprisingly low figure given Twitter's $44 billion valuation when it sold and TikTok's unique reach among young consumers in the world's largest economy.
Bloomberg reporting helped shed light on the modest price tag: unnamed sources indicated that ByteDance would retain significant value through an expensive licensing arrangement, potentially receiving about half of the new company's profits even if the company would hold just a 20 percent stake, according to Trump's plan.
Such terms could trigger alarm in Washington, where some lawmakers could scrutinize whether any sale meets the requirements of the divest-or-ban law that should have taken effect in January but has been repeatedly delayed since Trump took office.
And confusingly, the executive order announced Thursday extended the deadline to ban TikTok until mid-January to finalize a deal that the Trump administration simultaneously claimed was already complete.
John Moolenaar, the Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, reiterated this point on Friday and warned that he would be "conducting full oversight over this agreement."
"ByteDance has shown time and again that it is a bad actor," he said.
The Trump plan "offers vague assurances about protecting US national security but provides virtually no specifics," said Carl Tobias of the University of Richmond School of Law.
Adding to skepticism: Ellison's Oracle already manages TikTok's data servers from an earlier attempt to address US security concerns. Critics question whether this deal changes anything substantive.
TikTok: key things to know
Washington (AFP) Sept 26, 2025 -
TikTok boasts over a billion users worldwide, including more than 170 million in the United States, it says -- nearly half the country's population.
Here is a closer look at the phenomenonally successful app, with a US version on the cards after President Donald Trump signed off on a proposed deal giving control to his allies:
- Born in China -
TikTok's surge from niche video-sharing tool to global powerhouse is one of the biggest shifts in digital entertainment since the advent of social media.
From friends dancing together to home chefs sharing recipes, TikTok can transform ordinary users into celebrities, revolutionizing the traditional path to stardom.
It was launched in 2016 by Chinese tech company ByteDance for the local market, where it is called Douyin. The international version, TikTok, was released in 2017.
The app gained massive momentum after merging with Musical.ly, a lip-synching app, a year later.
- 'For You' page -
The so-called secret sauce in TikTok's rapid expansion has been its innovative recommendation algorithm.
Instead of showing content from accounts that users already follow, the endless scroll of TikTok's "For You" page is based on viewing habits, engagement patterns and sophisticated content analysis.
A video from a complete unknown can reach millions of people if the algorithm determines it engaging enough -- a model that the app's rivals have been quick to follow.
TikTok's focus on short clips also helps keep users hooked.
It was initially limited to uploads of 15 seconds, but this was later expanded to up to 10 minutes, and videos as long as 60 minutes are being trialed.
- Political suspicions -
TikTok's mass appeal means its rise has been controversial, mainly for its Chinese ownership and its built-in unpredictability.
The platform has faced scrutiny from governments worldwide, particularly in the United States, over data privacy and potential ties to the Chinese government -- including accusations of spying and propaganda.
India permanently banned TikTok along with other Chinese apps in 2020, citing national security concerns.
- Huge fine -
A European Union watchdog fined TikTok 530 million euros ($620 million) in May for failing to guarantee that its user data was shielded from access by Chinese authorities.
The social media giant says it will appeal the fine, insisting it has never received any requests from Chinese authorities for European users' data.
- Teenage safety fears -
Albania banned TikTok for a year in March after a 14-year-old schoolboy was killed in the culmination of a confrontation that started on social media.
Other jurisdictions have expressed fears about the potential effects of TikTok on young users, including accusations it funnels them into echo chambers and fails to contain illegal, violent or obscene content.
In a world first, Australia will later this year ban under-16s from social media such as TikTok and Instagram.
- Sell or be banned -
The US Congress passed legislation in 2024 requiring ByteDance to divest control of TikTok in the United States or be banned.
On Thursday, Trump signed an executive order laying out a proposed deal for a US version of the app that would see Chinese ownership reduced to 20 percent.
The president said the US version would be run by investors including Larry Ellison, the founder of cloud giant Oracle and tech investor Michael Dell.
He said Chinese President Xi Jinping gave his green light in a phone call last week.
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