TikTok Tells Users It Will Be Temporarily Unavailable in the U.S.
Hours before a new federal law banning TikTok from the United States was set to take effect, the social media app showed users a pop-up message that said it would be “temporarily unavailable” starting on Sunday.“We regret that a U.S.law banning TikTok will take effect on January 19,” the message said.
“We’re working to restore our service in the U.S.as soon as possible.”TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance and has been under scrutiny for national security concerns, appeared to be readying its users for how it might go offline.
At midnight, it was unclear if the app would still be available in U.S.app stores or how well it might run.The law has a provision to penalize app store operators like Apple and Google, and internet hosting companies like Oracle for distributing or maintaining the TikTok app.
Under the law, those companies face penalties as high as $5,000 per user who can access the app.TikTok’s message to U.S.users followed the Supreme Court decision on Friday upholding the law, which calls for ByteDance to sell the app by Sunday or otherwise face a ban.
The law had overwhelmingly passed Congress last year and been signed by President Biden.TikTok had expected to win its legal challenge to the law, but failed.TikTok had made last-minute pleas to both the Biden administration and President-elect Donald J.
Trump for a way out of the law.No one — including the U.S.
government — was entirely sure what would happen to it when the law took effect.The United States has never blocked an app used by tens of millions of Americans essentially overnight.For TikTok and ByteDance, the developments are a major blow.
TikTok has roughly 170 million users in the United States, who are some of the app’s most lucrative customers.In legal filings, TikTok has said that even a temporary disappearance could kneecap it, with users and creators leaving for other platforms and never returning even if a ban was lifted.
The situation was f...