TikTok ban takes effect in the United States

NEW YORK (AP) Millions of TikTok users in the United States are no longer able to watch videos on the social media platform as a federal ban on the immensely popular app takes effect .

The company's app was removed late Saturday from major app stores, including those operated by Apple and Google, while its website told users the short-form video platform was no longer available. The outage began just hours before the law took effect.

After her 5-7, 6-2, 6-1 victory over Belinda Bencic in the fourth round, Coco Gauff drew a broken heart on the lens of a television camera on the court with the message RIP TikTok USA, a reference to the ban. of the popular application with us.

Users opening the TikTok app on Saturday encountered a pop-up message preventing them from scrolling through videos that read: Sorry, TikTok is not available at the moment.

A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the United States, the post said. Unfortunately, this means you can't use TikTok at the moment.

We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated he will work with us on a solution to restore TikTok once he takes office, the statement continued, referring to President-elect Donald Trump's pledge to save the platform. The company asked its users to stay tuned.

The only option the message offers US users is to close the app or click on another option taking them to the platform's website. There, users receive the same message and are given the option to download their data, an action TikTok previously said could take days to process.

Before the announcement was made, TikTok said in another message to users that its service would be temporarily unavailable and that the company was working to restore its U.S. service as soon as possible. But it's unclear how long the platform will remain dark.

Apple said in a statement on its website that the TikTok and ByteDance apps were no longer available in the United States, while visitors to the country may have limited access. Apple is required to comply with the laws of the jurisdictions where it operates, the company said.

If these apps are already installed on your device, they will remain on your device. But they cannot be redownloaded if deleted or restored if you move to a new device. In-app purchases and new subscriptions are no longer possible, the statement said, adding that the change could impact performance, security and compatibility with future versions of iOS and iPadOS.

TikTok CEO Shou Chew posted a video thanking Trump for his commitment to working with the company to keep the app available in the United States and for his strong stance in support of the First Amendment and against arbitrary censorship.

We are grateful and happy to have the support of a president who truly understands our platform. One who used speech to express his own thoughts and perspectives, connecting with the world and thereby generating over 60 billion views of his content, Chew said.

A TikTok logo is displayed on a phone in San Francisco, Friday, Jan. 17, 2025. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

A TikTok logo is displayed on a phone in San Francisco, Friday, Jan. 17, 2025. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

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In an interview with NBC News on Saturday, President-elect Donald Trump said he was considering giving TikTok a 90-day extension that would allow it to continue operating. If such an extension happens, Trump, who once favored a ban on TikTok, said it would likely be announced Monday, the day he is inaugurated as president. TikTok CEO Shou Chew is expected to attend Trump's inauguration with a prime location.

In Washington, lawmakers and administration officials have long expressed concerns about the app, which they view as a national security threat because of its Chinese ownership. TikTok is owned by ByteDance, a Beijing-based technology company that operates popular video editing apps CapCut and Lemon8, both of which were unavailable Saturday night.

Federal law required ByteDance to cut ties with TikTok by Sunday or face a nationwide ban. The statute was passed by Congress in April after being included in a high-priority $95 billion package to provide foreign aid to Ukraine and Israel. President Joe Biden quickly signed it, and then TikTok and ByteDance quickly filed a lawsuit on First Amendment grounds.

While defending the law in court, the Biden administration argued that it was concerned that TikTok collects vast swathes of data on U.S. users that could fall into the hands of the Chinese government through coercion.

Authorities have also warned that the algorithm that powers what users see on the app is vulnerable to manipulation by Chinese authorities, who can use it to shape the platform's content in ways that are difficult to detect. But to date, the United States has not provided any public evidence that TikTok passed its users' data to Chinese authorities or changed its algorithm to benefit Chinese interests.

This cellphone screenshot shows a message from the TikTok app saying Sorry, TikTok is currently unavailable Saturday, Jan. 18, 2025, in San Bruno, Calif. (AP Photo/Stephanie Mullen)

This cellphone screenshot shows a message from the TikTok app saying Sorry, TikTok is currently unavailable Saturday, Jan. 18, 2025, in San Bruno, Calif. (AP Photo/Stephanie Mullen)

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The Supreme Court unanimously ruled Friday that the national security risk posed by TikTok's ties to China outweighs concerns about limiting the free speech of the app or its 170 million of users in the United States.

After the TikToks service began disappearing, some in China criticized the United States and accused it of removing the popular app. In an article published on Chinese social media platform Weibo, Hu Xijin, former editor-in-chief of the Chinese Communist Party newspaper Global Times, said TikTok's announcement to suspend services in America marked the darkest moment of the development of the Internet.

The country that claims to have the greatest freedom of expression carried out the most brutal takedown of an internet app, said Hu, who is now a political commentator. TikTok does not operate in China, where ByteDance instead offers Douyin, TikTok's Chinese sibling that follows Beijing's strict censorship rules.

After the court ruling, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco said the Biden administration would leave implementation of the laws to President-elect Donald Trump, being given that his inauguration falls the day after the ban came into force.

But TikTok said late Friday that it would be forced to shut down if the administration does not provide a definitive statement to companies, like Apple, Google and Oracle, that provide its services in the United States.

White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre called TikTok's request a stunt and said there was no reason for TikTok or other companies to take action in the coming days before the Trump administration took office. But despite these statements from the administration, confusion persisted about what was going to happen until TikTok began blocking its service.

Under the law, mobile app stores are prohibited from offering TikTok and internet hosting services from providing the service to U.S. users. Violators could face fines of up to $5,000 for each user who continues to access TikTok, meaning the penalties companies could face if they continue to offer TikTok could total a significant sum.

As written, experts said the law does not require TikTok to remove its platform, so it is unclear whether the company voluntarily shut it down or was not in compliance. able to keep the service alive after losing access support from its technology providers. The company did not respond to questions sent this week about its plans.

The statue allows the sitting president to extend the deadline by 90 days if a sale is pending. But no clear buyer has emerged and ByteDance has already said it will not sell TikTok.

On Saturday, artificial intelligence startup Perplexity AI submitted a proposal to ByteDance to create a new entity merging Perplexity with TikTok's U.S. business, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Perplexity does not ask to buy the ByteDance algorithm which feeds TikTok users' videos based on their interests and has made the platform such a phenomenon.

Other investors are also eyeing TikTok. Shark Tank star Kevin OLeary recently said that a consortium of investors formed by him and billionaire Frank McCourt offered ByteDance $20 billion in cash. Trump's Treasury Secretary, Steven Mnuchin, also said last year that he was putting together a group of investors to buy TikTok.

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Associated Press writer Kanis Leung contributed to this story from Hong Kong.

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