TikTok is officially inaccessible in the US. The Chinese app has completely gone dark and is not working, both on its mobile app and via the web. It went offline in what was Saturday night in the US, hours before the Sunday, January 19 deadline.
Users in the USA are now receiving this message: “We regret that a U.S. law banning TikTok will take effect on January 19 and force us to make our services temporarily unavailable. We’re working to restore our service in the U.S. as soon as possible, and we appreciate your support. Please stay tuned.
This message from the social media platform has since been adjusted to read as shown below.
The Internet observatory organization, Netblocks, has confirmed the shutdown was done by the Chinese company, not US authorities.
NetBlocks posted, “Note: Social media platform TikTok has deactivated its own service in the US after a ruling by the Supreme Court on Friday upholding a nationwide ban; there are no indications of widespread network-level restrictions imposed by internet providers at the present time.”
TikTok Not on App Store
In addition to being inaccessible, TikTok has been delisted from US Apple and Google app stores, similar to its status in Afghanistan, Myanmar, and India.
CapCut, the media-editing application also owned by ByteDance, has also shut down its services. The social app, Lemon8, which was briefly viewed as an alternative to TikTok, is also offline and unavailable in U.S. app stores.
Lawmakers and U.S. officials moved in April last year to force TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to sell its stake in the app or be cut off from the U.S. market. The law gave the company a deadline of Jan. 19.
On Friday, the US Supreme Court ruled that the law does not violate the First Amendment rights of the app and its users. The court upheld the federal government’s national security argument and left TikTok open to a ban on Jan. 19 unless it is sold to an American company.
Donald Trump, who is to be inaugurated on Monday, has shown public support for keeping TikTok in the U.S. Trump said the court’s decision was “expected” and that his decision on the app “will be made in the not-too-distant future”.
He insisted he needed time to review the situation. Trump has indicated giving the app a 90-day extension is something he is most likely to do.
Read: TikTok CEO Attends Trump’s Inauguration: What’s Next for the App?
That deadline is now here and there has been no sale agreed. TikTok has gone dark in the land meant to be for the free. The ban results in a massive censorship of over 170 million Americans.
