The TikTok ban, which occurred on Sat., Jan. 19, 2025, had caused quite a sensation amongst its users and had Americans questioning the safety of using the platform.
Despite the reactions of many Americans, this does not come as a total shock. Joe Biden, the former President of the United States, had passed the condition, on April 23rd, 2024, that the owner of TikTok, ByteDance was to sell this platform to an American company within 270 days – or TikTok would be banned on all American devices.
This wasn’t a spontaneous decision, and Joe Biden had clear reasons as to why he wanted an American company to own TikTok.
An article by Thompson Nine states that one of these reasons was his concern that TikTok was a way for ByteDance, a Chinese media company, to steal American data. TikTok, on the other hand, has vehemently denied all allegations of this.
After 270 days passed and ByteDance failed to meet his behalf of the condition, Joe Biden stayed true to his word by prohibiting the usage of TikTok for all Americans for approximately 12 hours.
As of right now, the current President of America, Donald Trump has extended the deadline (to sell TikTok) by 75 days to come to an agreement with ByteDance, who has been given the chance to partner with an American company. This means that they must have an agreement by April 5, 2025.
The American government is unsure what to make of TikTok and its influence on its users. This is largely due to the fact that, as stated by a website called the Scientific American, “There is no public proof that ByteDance has handed U.S. user data to Beijing”.
The users of TikTok, however, have some things to say about the impact of TikTok on them. A plethora of people feel an intense attachment to the app, which is reflected in a survey conducted between April and May 2023, reporting that 77.7% of Gen Z users feel TikTok is addictive.
In addition to that, according to the Pew Research Center, about 50% of Americans surveyed supported a ban on TikTok.
Whether a TikTok ban is a good solution in combatting social media addiction and protecting Americans is highly subjective, and only time will tell if America is right about its allegations regarding China or not.
