NEW YORK (AP) — The TikTok app was removed from major app stores in the United States on Saturday night, just before a federal law banning the popular social media platform took effect.
As of 10:50 p.m. EST, the app was not in the app stores of Apple and Google, which are prohibited from offering the platform under a law that requires TikTok’s parent company, China-based ByteDance sells platform or faces ban in the United States.
When users opened the TikTok app on Saturday night, they found a pop-up message from the company preventing them from scrolling through videos.
“A law has been passed banning TikTok in the United States,” the message said. “Unfortunately, that means you can’t use TikTok for now.”
“We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to restore TikTok once he takes office,” the message said. “Please stay tuned!”
Before that announcement was issued, the company had told users in another message that its service would be “temporarily unavailable” and informed them that it was working to restore its service in the country “as soon as possible.”
Federal law, signed by President Joe Biden last year, required ByteDance to divest its stake in the TikTok platform in the United States or face a ban. ByteDance had nine months to sell the US business to an authorized buyer. The company and TikTok chose to take legal action against the law and ultimately lost their battle in the Supreme Court on Friday.
Under the law, mobile app stores are prohibited from offering TikTok and internet hosting services are prohibited from providing the service to American users.
Both White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco had said that the Biden administration would delegate implementation of the law to President-elect Donald Trump, given that his inauguration occurs on day after the ban comes into force.
However, TikTok said after the court ruling on Friday that it “will be forced to shut down” if the government does not provide a “definitive statement” to companies providing its service in the United States.
However, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre called TikTok’s lawsuit a “stunt” and said there was no reason for TikTok or other companies to “take action in the coming days before the Trump administration takes office.”
In an interview with NBC News on Saturday, President-elect Donald Trump said he was considering granting TikTok a 90-day extension that would allow them to continue operating.
Federal law allows the sitting president to extend the deadline by 90 days if a sale is in process. But no clear buyers have emerged, and ByteDance has previously said it will not sell TikTok.
If that extension happens, Trump said it would “probably” be announced Monday.
Artificial intelligence startup Perplexity AI on Saturday submitted a proposal to ByteDance to create a new entity that would merge Perplexity with TikTok’s U.S. business, according to a person familiar with the matter. If successful, the new structure would also include other investors and allow existing ByteDance shareholders to retain their stake in the company, the person said.
Perplexity has not asked to buy the ByteDance algorithm that offers videos to TikTok users based on their interests, and that has turned the platform into a phenomenon.
Other investors have also set their sights on TikTok. “Shark Tank” star Kevin O’Leary recently said that a consortium of investors he put together with billionaire Frank McCourt offered ByteDance $20 billion in cash. Trump’s Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin also said last year that he was putting together a group of investors to buy TikTok.
