On April 24, 2024, former President Joe Biden signed a bill passed by the United States Congress that required ByteDance, the Chinese company that owned the social media app TikTok, to divest of its ownership within the next 9 months or face a nationwide ban. The bill quickly became quite a controversial topic within the TikTok and social media communities, with many questioning if the government really made the right move to ban an app out of fear that the Chinese government was potentially gathering sensitive personal data without their users’ knowledge.
“I think that it’s completely unnecessary,” said Aurora Jass, a sophomore at Chandler High School. “TikTok is a very easily accessible way for people of all ages to get information, and to strip that away from millions of people is a violation of free speech and for many would remove their source of income.” Aurora believes that banning TikTok would violate free speech laws and take away an extremely popular app that is used by millions of Americans for information, entertainment, and income.
The controversy began because the TikTok app was rumored to gather the sensitive personal data of users without their consent, including personal details, location data, and device information. U.S. lawmakers proposed legislation that would ban ByteDance, the parent company who owns TikTok and several other apps, from operating in the United States. In addition to TikTok, ByteDance is the owner of several other apps that are used by millions of Americans, including CapCut, Gauth, Lemon8, and Marvel Snap.
Nine months after the bill to ban TikTok was signed, it went into effect on January 19, 2025, and TikTok informed their users that their app was officially shutting down in the United States until further notice. In addition to TikTok being inaccessible to millions of Americans, all other apps owned by ByteDance were similarly affected.
As you may expect, this left millions of avid TikTok users highly unhappy. While some users and content creators returned or switched to American-owned social media platforms like Instagram, YouTube, or Snapchat, many disgruntled TikTok users protested by signing up for RedNote, a Shanghai-based social media app with mostly Chinese users that is similar to Instagram (which is not accessible in China).
After several years of ban rumors, many TikTok fans feared that the app was truly banned for good this time. However, the app was surprisingly unbanned in the United States approximately twelve hours after the ban took effect. Why? It turned out that President Donald Trump signed an executive order pausing the TikTok ban for 75 days to allow ByteDance additional time to find an American company to purchase the app. In the meantime, TikTok was accessible again for US users, much to the relief of social media fans everywhere.
There are still plenty of things to argue about from this ban. Some believe that this ban was implemented just to eliminate Chinese competition in the United States, while others believe it was totally not needed. Omar Duarte, a Chandler High School freshman, stated, “I really don’t think it was necessary to ban TikTok. Sure, it’s from China, but it wouldn’t affect much at all since it’s just social media.”
Only time will tell whether TikTok will eventually survive in the United States. Many prominent American companies and businesspeople have publicly expressed interest in purchasing TikTok, including Microsoft, Oracle, and Elon Musk, who also owns X (formerly Twitter) and SpaceX.
