PRC regulatory requirements for communication is expensive for domestic players, why should western entrants be spared? That's like allowing PRC auto in US on less stringent safety requirements. The reason FB and twitter pulled out in 09 after minority/terrorist attacks was because they didn't have the moderation system in place, while PRC platforms had 10000s of expensive, physical bodies doing the grunt work at the time. Which was prescient, and it wasn't until western platforms started implementing mass moderation post NZ shooting that they started initatives to retner PRC market (FB & Google at least), because they finally spent the money and can now scale it in PRC. It was only internal drama at FB and Google that killed the project. If anything TikTok has to bend backwards harder than US platforms to appease US gov because they don't know what "speech" triggers US politicians, whereas in PRC, western companies just had to say yes to censorship and access requests.