TikTok plans immediate shutdown in US on Sunday

On By Littum

TikTok plans to shut down its app for US users on Sunday, January 19, the same day a law banning the app in the US goes into effect, according to multiple reports.

The move would see the popular app – which says it has 170 million monthly US users – go a step further than the law, signed by President Biden last April, requires. The law prohibits new downloads from Apple’s App Store and Google Play App Store and also makes it “illegal” to update the app. In other words, existing users could keep the app on their phones but it would never update.

TikTok, which is owned by Beijing-based ByteDance, plans to shut down in the US immediately instead, The information reported late Tuesday night. Reuters confirmed the news on their end Wednesday morning, saying that TikTok plans to direct users on Sunday to a page about the ban and allow them to download their data.

The law banning TikTok requires ByteDance to divest its US operations to remain operating stateside. The biggest concern US lawmakers say they have with TikTok is that it could doubles as a spyware app for the Chinese Communist Government; TikTok is required by Chinese law to share user data if requested.

In the days leading up to the ban, two Chinese social apps – Xiaohongshu and Lemon8, which is also operated by ByteDance – raced to the top of Apple’s App Store (You can read more about Lemon8 by by clicking here).

A potential TikTok ban has been brewing for several years now. Donald Trump first proposed removing the app from the US during his first term in office, before Congress ultimately passed the law banning the app last year.

Despite his initial support, President-elect Trump has since changed his stance on banning TikTok, saying last year that he wanted to “save” the app. And in December, Trump reiterated that he would like to keep TikTok in the United States. He said he would “take a look” at saving TikTok, noting that he had a “warm spot” in his heart for it because it helped get young people to vote for him.

The Supreme Court is currently weighing TikTok’s appeal to overturn the law banning the app, but that doesn’t seem likely until Sunday, when the app’s ban date hits.

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