TikTok restoring service after Trump's statement, company says
TikTok said Sunday it will be back online for users in the U.S. after going dark Saturday night.
In a statement on X, the company said they made an agreement with providers to restore service after President-elect Donald Trump said Sunday that he'll issue an executive order Monday to delay the TikTok ban.
"We thank President Trump for providing the necessary clarity and assurance to our service providers that they will face no penalties providing TikTok to over 170 million Americans and allowing over 7 million small businesses to thrive," the statement reads. "It’s a strong stand for the First Amendment and against arbitrary censorship. We will work with President Trump on a long-term solution that keeps TikTok in the United States."
Will Trump save TikTok?
What they're saying:
President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday said he plans to issue an executive order Monday giving TikTok's parent company more time to find an approved buyer before permanently banning the app in the U.S. Trump announced the decision in a post on his Truth Social account.
In an interview with NBC News on Saturday, Trump said he was thinking about giving TikTok a 90-day extension that would allow them to continue operating.
TikTok CEO Shou Chew posted a video thanking Trump for his commitment to work with the company to keep the app available in the U.S. and a "strong stand for the first amendment and against arbitrary censorship."
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"We are grateful and pleased to have the support of a president who truly understands our platform. One who has used talk to express his own thoughts and perspectives, connecting with the world and generating more than 60 billion views of his content in the process," Chew said.
Chew is expected to attend Trump’s inauguration with a prime seating location.
"We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reinstate TikTok once he takes office," the notice on TikTok’s website states, in a reference to Trump's pledge to "save" the platform. The company told its users to stay tuned.
What’s next for TikTok?
Users opening the TikTok app on Saturday encountered a pop-up message preventing them from scrolling videos that read, "Sorry, TikTok isn't available right now."
"A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the U.S.," the message said. "Unfortunately that means you can’t use TikTok for now."
FILE - TikTok ban illustration (Photo by MAEVA DESTOMBES/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images)
The only option the message gave to U.S. users is to close the app or click another option leading them to the platform's website. There, users are shown the same message and given the option to download their data, an action TikTok previously said may take days to process.
By midday Sunday, some users were reporting the app was back and available on their phones.
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TikTok concerns
The backstory:
In Washington, lawmakers and administration officials have long raised concerns about the app, which they see as a national security threat due to its Chinese ownership. TikTok is owned by ByteDance, a technology company based in Beijing that operates the well-known video editing app CapCut and Lemon8, both of which were also unavailable for service Saturday evening.
The 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 it was included as part of a high-priority $95 billion package that provided foreign aid to Ukraine and Israel. President Joe Biden quickly signed it, and then TikTok and ByteDance quickly sued on First Amendment grounds.
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While defending the law in court, the Biden administration argued it was concerned about TikTok collecting vast swaths of U.S. user data that could fall into the hands of the Chinese government through coercion.
The rise - and potential fall - of TikTok in US
TikTok on Friday said that the social media platform would "go dark" on Sunday without "definitive" assurance from the Biden administration that its ban will not be enforced. Star Kashman, Founding Partner at Cyber Law Firm, joined LiveNOW from FOX to discuss.
Officials have also warned the algorithm that fuels what users see on the app is vulnerable to manipulation by Chinese authorities, who can use it to shape content on the platform in a way that’s difficult to detect. But to date, the U.S. has not publicly provided evidence of TikTok handing user data to Chinese authorities or tinkering with its algorithm to benefit Chinese interests.
The Supreme Court unanimously decided on Friday the risk to national security posed by TikTok's ties to China overcomes concerns about limiting speech by the app or its 170 million users in the United States.
Will ByteDance sell TikTok?
Dig deeper:
The law allows the sitting president to extend the deadline by 90 days if a sale is in progress. But no clear buyers have emerged, and ByteDance has previously said it won’t sell TikTok.
On Saturday, artificial intelligence startup Perplexity AI submitted a proposal to ByteDance to create a new entity that merges Perplexity with TikTok U.S. business, according to a person familiar with the matter.
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Perplexity is not asking to purchase the ByteDance algorithm that feeds TikTok user’s videos based on their interests..
Other investors have also been eyeing TikTok. "Shark Tank" star Kevin O’Leary recently said a consortium of investors that he and billionaire Frank McCourt put together offered ByteDance $20 billion in cash. Trump’s former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin also said last year that he was putting together an investor group to buy TikTok.
The Source: This report includes information from the Associated Press and previous LiveNow from FOX reporting.