what's the noise about sell or ban Tik Tok. 

If not greed is good mindset of the western governments like America and Europe, China has banned almost all social tech networks. 

For years, TikTok leadership tried to convince the United States that the popular social media app used by as many as 170 million Americans was not a threat to national security.

It lost that fight Tuesday night when the Senate passed the sell-or-ban TikTok bill with overwhelming bipartisan support.

Tucked into a $95 billion foreign aid package, the legislation gives Chinese parent company ByteDance up to a year to sell TikTok’s U.S. operations or face a ban. President Joe Biden said he would sign it Wednesday.

"The long threatened TikTok ban is now here with the clock starting once Biden signs the bill into law," Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives said.

Time hasn't run out for TikTok just yet. The legislation will likely face legal challenges from TikTok and its supporters.

TikTok could not be immediately reached for comment. On Saturday the company issued a statement accusing lawmakers of jamming through a bill that tramples free speech rights, harms American businesses and threatens to shutter a platform that contributes billions to the U.S. economy.

Congress passes sell-or-ban bill. Is TikTok going to be banned?

In March, the House voted overwhelmingly to approve a bill to force ByteDance's hand. The bill then moved to the Senate, where its fate was uncertain.

Last week House Speaker Mike Johnson tied it to a foreign aid package for Ukraine and Israel, putting it on a fast track to becoming law and increasing the possibility of a ban in the United States.

The House on Saturday approved the emergency spending package on a bipartisan 360-to-58 vote. The Senate passed the measure 79-18 Tuesday and it will now head to Biden's desk.

TikTok has said it will exhaust every available legal avenue before considering a sale. It has successfully fought back similar measures.

Why does Congress want to ban TikTok?

Fans of the app flooded lawmakers with angry calls protesting the TikTok legislation. But lawmakers say control of the app by a foreign adversary is too great a risk.

"Many Americans, particularly young Americans, are rightfully skeptical. At the end of the day, they've not seen what Congress has seen. They've not been in the classified briefings that Congress has held, which have delved more deeply into some of the threats posed by foreign control of TikTok," Mark Warner (D-Va.), Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said on the Senate floor Tuesday.

TikTok says it has never been asked to provide U.S. user data to the Chinese government and wouldn’t if asked.

The legislation has heightened tensions with China. Last week Apple removed several apps including Meta’s WhatsApp and Threads from its app store in China at Beijing’s request in apparent retaliation for the legislation.

Senators deny TikTok bill is a 'ban bill'

Senators who supported the legislation denied it was a "ban bill." Warner said lawmakers hope Tiktok "will continue under new ownership."

"For several months now, we’ve heard from constituents how much they value TikTok as a creative platform," he said. "To those Americans I would emphasize, this is not a ban of a service you appreciate."

TikTok has said it considers any law that would force a sale the equivalent of a ban because of the hurdles facing a sale.

Beijing can block a sale or it can refuse to allow a sale that includes the powerful TikTok algorithm that recommends videos to users.

When would ByteDance be forced to sell TikTok?

The bill itself gives ByteDance nearly a year to divest TikTok – nine months, with a possible three-month extension – far longer than the six-month deadline the original House measure proposed.

“We think a year is an ample time to allow potential investors to come forward for due diligence to be completed and for lawyers to draw up and finalize contracts,” Sen. Maria Cantwell, (D-Wash.), chair of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, said Tuesday on the Senate floor.

Who is interested in buying TikTok?

"While the price tag will be eye-popping, TikTok's strategic value and consumer platform will have a number of financial and tech strategic players interested," Ives said.

Investor groups and major tech giants including Microsoft, Apple and Oracle will consider bids, according to Ives. He also expects joint bids from a handful of Big Tech companies.

Former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and "Shark Tank" star Kevin O’Leary have also expressed interest in buying TikTok.

An initial public offering or a spin-off are two other potential outcomes, Ives said.

How would a TikTok ban work?

If signed into law, the bill would prevent app stores like Apple and Google from distributing or updating TikTok and web hosting companies from distributing it.

Banning the app won’t necessarily stop TikTok fans from using it. In 2020 when India banned TikTok after an incident at the Chinese border, TikTok users found workarounds to circumvent the ban.

Those strategies include using a VPN or changing your location on your phone to fool the app stores. Another option is "side-loading" − downloading and installing a bootleg version of the TikTok app from the internet − but it carries the risk of downloading malware.

Where do Biden and Trump stand on a TikTok ban?

Biden supports a forced sale of TikTok but has not called for a ban of the app, his top science advisor said at Semafor's World Economy Summit last week.

"The big issue for TikTok from a national security perspective is about the vast amount of information that the platform is able to collect about people and specifically the fact that because of its ownership there’s a direct line to the People’s Republic of China, which in the geopolitics of today is a deeply concerning issue," Arati Prabhakar, the White House Director of Science and Technology Policy, said.

Former president Donald Trump, who tried to ban TikTok in 2020, posted to Truth Social on Monday: "Just so everyone knows, especially the young people, Crooked Joe Biden is responsible for banning TikTok."

Now that Trump has changed his mind about TikTok, ByteDance could wait out the election to see which party has control after November.

Who opposes the TikTok bill? Free speech advocates

Free speech advocates have spoken out against the possibility of a TikTok ban. They say banning TikTok is the wrong way to address concerns about the practices of social media companies.

"Longstanding Supreme Court precedent protects Americans' First Amendment right to access information, ideas, and media from abroad. By banning TikTok, the bill would infringe on this right, and with no real pay-off,"Nadine Farid Johnson, policy director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, said in a statement. “China and other foreign adversaries could still purchase Americans’ sensitive data from data brokers on the open market. And they could still engage in disinformation campaigns using American-owned platforms.”

The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a science and technology policy think tank, also opposes the TikTok bill.

"The TikTok ban is bad policy, plain and simple," the foundation's vice president, Daniel Castro, said in a statement. And, he said, "it will not stop China’s techno-nationalist agenda."

Who would benefit from a TikTok ban?

YouTube, Facebook and Instagram would benefit most from a TikTok ban.

"We would expect Meta to be the primary recipient of redistributed TikTok revenue should the company exit the U.S., with Google the likely No. 2 beneficiary," said Wedbush Securities analyst Scott Devitt.

Devitt said a recent survey of TikTok users found that 60% would switch to Facebook or Instagram and 19% would primarily replace TikTok with YouTube.

Snapchat and Pinterest could also draw users and advertising dollars from TikTok, analysts say.

YouTube continues to be the No. 1 app with teens. Nine in 10 teens use the app, followed by TikTok (63%), Snapchat (60%) and Instagram (59%), according to Pew Research Center. Teens are less likely to use Facebook and X (formerly Twitter) than they were a decade ago.

X owner Elon Musk conducted a poll on the social media platform, hinting he might bring back mobile video app Vine.  Musk said Friday that he opposed banning TikTok.

"In my opinion, TikTok should not be banned in the USA, even though such a ban may benefit the X platform," he wrote on X. "Doing so would be contrary to freedom of speech and expression. It is not what America stands for."

What do Americans think about a TikTok ban?

The American public remains divided.

Nearly half of the respondents in a CNBC All-America Economic Survey poll taken in March say TikTok should be banned or sold to a non-Chinese company.

Forty percent of Democrats and 60% of Republicans support a ban or a sale of the popular app, the survey found.