
TikTok has reactivated its service in the United States after receiving cursory assurances from President Donald Trump that his administration will work with the China-based social video platform to comply with a law passed last year.
The law required TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, to divest its American operations under threat of banishment from U.S. app stores operated by Apple, Google, Samsung and others.
The measure did not require TikTok to shut down its U.S. operations, nor did it prevent Americans who already had the app installed on their devices from using it. But it did prevent American companies from doing business with TikTok, making it difficult for the company to continue operating in the U.S. after January 19, the deadline that the law imposed for ByteDance to rid itself of its U.S. business.
Federal officials justified the law on homeland security concerns associated with data collection and sharing practices, few of which were substantiated with publicly-available evidence. The law was integrated into a federal appropriations bill that was largely intended to provide financial support to Ukraine and Israel for ongoing conflicts there.
President Trump and former President Biden have, at separate times, backed a ban on TikTok if the company was unwilling to sell off its American business. Trump reversed himself in recent weeks after Republicans expressed concern that banning TikTok would choke them off from millions of followers and constituents.
ByteDance has tried to fight the law in court, and lost at nearly every step. The matter eventually reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which issued a unanimous order on Friday that paved the way for the ban to be implemented.
Apple, Google and others promptly made TikTok unavailable to U.S. consumers through their app stores, and the app remains unavailable today. But TikTok has restored its service to American users after receiving assurances from the Trump administration that they will take a hands-off approach while seeking a solution that allows TikTok to operate long-term in the country.
The Verge, a publication that covers consumer technology, said Oracle and its content delivery network partner, Akamai, were “relying on Trump’s promise that there would be no liability for companies that support TikTok.”
Legally, the companies are violating the law that was passed during Biden’s term in office, even if the Trump administration affirms it willingness to look the other way. There are few assurances that will be the case in the coming months and years, and some Republicans have said TikTok and its partners could ultimately be found liable for violating the law should Trump’s position change.
“Any company that hosts, distributes, services, or otherwise facilitates communist-controlled TikTok could face hundreds of billions of dollars of ruinous liability under the law,” Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas, a Republican, wrote on the social platform X (formerly Twitter).
He continued that the U.S. Department of Justice might impose its own criminal fines for violating the law, as well as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. TikTok could also face shareholder lawsuits and legal challenges from various state attorneys general. He offered no specifics about what those legal challenges might look like, but warned TikTok and its partners to “think about it.”
Christopher Wheat, a former Amazon Web Services technical architect who now serves as the director of Brie Capital, wrote that “the best thing for the United States is to either significantly modify the App, or an outright ban as the U.S. Supreme Court ruled recently.”
Wheat misstated the Supreme Court’s ruling, which was to affirm a lower court finding that TikTok had not proven itself worth of an injunction to prevent the law from taking effect; TikTok had argued that the law violated the First Amendment protections of its company and its users.