Supreme Court rules to uphold TikTok ban, setting stage for shutdown

The Supreme Court has upheld a law requiring China-based ByteDance to divest its ownership of TikTok by Sunday or face an effective ban on the popular social video app in the United States

ByteDance has so far refused to sell TikTok, meaning many US users could lose access to the app this weekend. The app may still work for those who already have TikTok on their phones, although ByteDance has also threatened to shut down the app.

In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court sided with the Biden administration and upheld the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, which President Joe Biden signed in April.

“There is no doubt that TikTok provides a unique and far-reaching outlet for expression, a means of engagement, and a source of community for more than 170 million Americans,” the Supreme Court’s opinion said. “But Congress has determined that divestiture is necessary to address its well-founded national security concerns about TikTok’s data collection practices and relationship with a foreign adversary.”

Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Neil Gorsuch have issued written consents.

As required by law, external Internet service providers like Apple And Google will be punished for endorsing a TikTok owned by ByteDance after the January 19 deadline.

If ISPs and app store owners comply, they will remove TikTok from their respective app stores, preventing users from downloading TikTok or installing the necessary updates that make the app functional.

The fate of TikTok in the US now rests in the hands of President-elect Donald Trump, who in December asked the Supreme Court to suspend implementation of the law and give his administration “the opportunity to reach a political resolution of the issues at issue in this case to strive for”. “

Trump will be sworn in on Monday, a day after the TikTok sales deadline. TikTok CEO Shou Chew is one of several tech leaders expected to sit on the panel.

In December, members of the Chinese Communist Party’s House of Representatives special committee sent letters to Apple CEO Tim Cook and Google CEO Sundar Pichai, urging executives to prepare to comply with the law and reminding them of their app store responsibilities operators recalled.

Last Friday, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments from attorneys representing TikTok, content creators and the U.S. government. TikTok’s lead attorney, Noel Francisco, argued that the law violates the First Amendment rights of the app’s 170 million American users. Meanwhile, U.S. Attorney General Elizabeth Prelogar countered that the app’s alleged ties to the People’s Republic of China through its parent company ByteDance posed a threat to national security.

After oral arguments concluded, several legal experts believed that the country’s highest court was more sympathetic to the U.S. government’s case surrounding TikTok’s allegedly questionable ties to the Chinese government.

Many TikTok creators have advised their fans to find them on competing social platforms such as Google’s YouTube and Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, CNBC reported. Additionally, following last Friday’s Supreme Court hearing, Instagram executives have scheduled meetings to instruct workers to prepare for a wave of users if the court upholds the law, the CNBC report said.

Chinese social media app and TikTok-like RedNote rose to the top of Apple’s App Store on Monday, suggesting millions of TikTok users were looking for alternatives.

The Chinese government was also considering a contingency plan that included Elon Musk’s takeover of TikTok’s US operations as part of several options to prevent the app from being effectively banned in the US, Bloomberg News reported on Monday. The plan is one of several the Chinese government is considering as part of larger discussions about cooperation with the incoming Trump White House, the report said.

REGARD: SCOTUS hears TikTok ban case.