TikTok is a popular entertainment platform whose motto is to bring joy, but eventually gets caught up in political controversy.

For a long time, political videos were not welcome on TikTok, an app owned by ByteDance, based in Beijing, China, because the company's development team is said to want to avoid any

Therefore, videos containing images of people with disabilities, even the slogan "Bring America Great Again", have been blocked or mounted by TikTok.

TikTok later apologized and explained that this was a minor incident, while also allowing users to post videos of the protest wave in recent weeks, including police photos of pepper spray in the crowd, foul sweat.

The situation goes even further, as some TikTok users are testing ways to organize political action on apps.

On July 7, TikTok was again caught in political controversy, when the company's spokesman announced that they would withdraw from Hong Kong, soon after China imposed a new security law in the special zone.

This may be aimed at avoiding content censorship requests, or sharing user data, in accordance with TikTok's guidelines.

TikTok also faces increasing pressure from the United States, as it fears that the hosting company may share user data with Chinese intelligence and security agencies.

A spokesman for TikTok said the Chinese government has never offered access to any user data, adding that they will not share even if requested.

Trouble with TikTok comes amid intense debate over the extent of control of content by social media companies.

Although growing in the West, TikTok is still built on the Chinese legal system, which poses a risk of annoying users accustomed to freedom of opinion.

According to WSJ commentators, by recruiting Kevin Mayer, former American director of Walt Disney, as the new chief executive, TikTok is trying to find the right balance between letting users freely mention the owner.

ByteDance developed TikTok in 2017 from an emerging app in China called Musical.ly, acquired by ByteDance.

After the protest movement broke out in Hong Kong last year, TikTok asked the executive team to remove protest videos until mid-2019, a source familiar with the matter revealed.

TikTok says their decisions are always rooted in the desire to keep the app fun.

"TikTok's strategies at the beginning were extremely demanding, all just trying to maintain the most positive atmosphere possible on the platform. It's obviously the wrong approach," said Eric Han, director.

However, loosening restrictions puts TikTok at risk in China, where the government has put pressure on businesses that do not follow their cultural standards, despite the spokesperson of

"The TikTok app is not even available in China. Our censorship content and policies are set by the US team, not affected by any foreign government," the spokesman said.

In response to Washington's concerns about security risks, TikTok said its user data is stored in servers in the US and Singapore, and stressed that it will not share them.

Senator Josh Hawley, who used to call TikTok a "surveillance machine on every app that downloads apps", proposed a bill to ban TikTok on all government devices, while calling Mayer, the chief

Late last month, India decided to ban TikTok and dozens of other Chinese applications, following a clash at the border of the two countries that killed 20 Indian soldiers.

Mayer said Chinese officials had never asked for TikTok user data in India, adding that they would not comply if the Chinese government requested it.