TikTok became unavailable in the United States on Saturday night (18), less than two hours before a ban on the social network came into effect.
Visitors to the app were greeted with a message saying: “Sorry, TikTok is currently unavailable. A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the US. Unfortunately, this means you cannot use TikTok for now.”
The law blocking TikTok was passed last year with strong bipartisan support and signed into law by President Joe Biden. Lawmakers said TikTok’s ties to China and its access to vast amounts of data pose a threat to national security.
Many US users told CNN who were preparing for the app’s demise, including influencers and other small businesses who said they depended on the platform for a living. Still, they said they were hopeful the app would be saved somehow.
Despite this, the Supreme Court confirmed the ban on Friday (17), dashing hopes of last-minute judicial assistance.
Meanwhile, Trump — who first warned about the dangers of TikTok five years ago — Earlier this month, on his Truth Social account, he posted statistics about his own popularity on TikTok and asked, “Why would I want to get rid of from TikTok?”
TikTok CEO Shou Chew met with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago home in the weeks before the ban took effect and is expected to attend Trump’s inauguration on Monday.
A 90-day extension?
The law passed last year allows the president to delay the ban from taking effect by 90 days, but requires evidence that parties working to arrange a sale of TikTok to a U.S.-owned company have made significant progress.
But TikTok owner ByteDance rejected potential buyers.
After the Supreme Court unanimously ruled to uphold the ban, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre signaled that the administration would not enforce the law on Biden’s final day in office.
Due to the federal holiday and inauguration, “actions to implement the law simply must be up to the next administration,” she said.
But TikTok was not satisfied with this statement. According to a person familiar with the matter, some service providers — companies like Google and Apple that would face exorbitant fines for allowing U.S. access to TikTok once the ban takes effect — told TikTok they believed they were vulnerable. under the law from Sunday.
Service providers “do not feel they have received sufficient assurances that they will not be held liable,” the person told CNN on Friday.
Then TikTok issued a public warning that it would be “forced to go dark” on Sunday unless the Biden administration was more explicit “to satisfy the most critical service providers by ensuring non-enforcement.”
TikTok employees were also told by the company on Saturday that the situation was “disappointing” but that the company was working on a solution.
“We know this is disappointing for you, not just as employees, but as users. However, we are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reestablish TikTok once he takes office. Please know that our teams are working tirelessly to bring our app back to the US as quickly as possible,” the message to employees said.
What is the future of TikTok?
Trump is reportedly considering issuing an executive order that could effectively pause the ban and provide some time to iron out a long-term solution.
But he will face pressure from many directions. Some Republican senators, such as Josh Hawley of Missouri and Tom Cotton of Arkansas, continue to strongly support the ban.
“ByteDance and its Communist Chinese masters had nine months to sell TikTok before the Sunday deadline,” Cotton wrote on X. “The very fact that Communist China refuses to allow its sale reveals exactly what TikTok is: a communist spy app.”
Analyst Richard Greenfield of LightShed Partners, who has been following the TikTok saga for a long time, predicts that TikTok will eventually come back online in the United States.
On Saturday, Perplexity AI, a San Francisco-based AI search engine startup, confirmed to CNN which sent a proposal to ByteDance to merge with TikTok.
