Congress is right to want to curtail TikTok’s power and influence | Nita Farahany

Millions of young Americans love the social media app - but it's alarmingly addictive and a national security risk

Imagine a world where America's foreign adversaries don't need spies or hackers to infiltrate our society or meddle with our democracy. Instead, they can deploy a far more insidious tool: a digital platform, addictive by design, that captivates its users and then mobilizes them to influence our democratic institutions.

The scenario may sound farfetched, but something like that recently happened. Earlier this month, while the US Congress was considering a bill that would curtail TikTok's operations in the United States, the popular, Chinese-owned social media platform confronted its users with a kind of digital ransom note calling for political action. As the New York Times reported, TikTok's campaign sparked a deluge of calls to Capitol Hill, overwhelming some congressional offices and demonstrating the platform's political influence.

Nita Farahany is the author of The Battle for Your Brain: Defending Your Right to Think Freely in the Age of Neurotechnology and the Robinson O Everett professor of law and philosophy at Duke University