A US law that could ban the popular video-sharing app TikTok, owned by a China-based company, cleared a major hurdle in Congress on Wednesday.
The House of Representatives in Washington passed the bill in a 352-65 vote. It now goes to the Senate, where its fate is unclear.
President Joe Biden has made it known that he would sign the bill into law should it reach his desk.
But sceptics of the measure point out that the law, if passed, will likely spend years in the courts, saying it is sure to be challenged on free speech protections enshrined in the US Constitution.
The legislation has support among both Republicans and Democrats.
Lawmakers who support the bill note that it does not outright ban TikTok.
Instead, it aims to force a change in ownership. The law would only lead to TikTok being banned from US app stores if the service remains in the possession of China's ByteDance group.
In Washington, there have been fears for years about ByteDance's access to user data.
Some cybersecurity experts say the data could be used by Beijing to spread propaganda in the United States, spy on users, and exercise other forms of influence.
TikTok says it has 170 million US users.
During his time in office as president, Donald Trump attempted to ban TikTok from app stores and compel ByteDance to spin off TikTok. But the effort was stymied by the courts.
