Judge Temporarily Blocks US Ban of TikTok App Downloads

Melanie Sun
By Melanie Sun
September 27, 2020US News
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Judge Temporarily Blocks US Ban of TikTok App Downloads
The logo of the social network application TikTok and a U.S. flag are shown on the screens of two laptops in Beijing, China, on Sept. 14, 2020. (Nicolas Asfouri/AFP via Getty Images)

A federal district judge has ruled to temporarily grant China-based TikTok owner ByteDance a preliminary injunction, which will allow the app to remain available for download from U.S. app stores.

The Trump administration’s ban of TikTok updates and downloads in the United States was set to take effect at 11:59 p.m. on Sunday as ByteDance continues negotiations with U.S. companies Oracle and Walmart over a potential sale of U.S. operations.

However, further restrictions outlined by the Commerce Department for the popular video-sharing app—if the security of Americans’ data cannot be guaranteed—have not “at this time” been blocked, U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols in Washington said in his ruling. Nichols was appointed to the District Court in June 2019 by President Donald Trump.

President Trump in an August executive order (pdf) outlined Nov. 12 as the deadline for current app owner Bytedance to divest its U.S. assets, or see TikTok shutdown in the United States.

The Commerce Department responded to the ruling Sunday saying that it would comply with the ruling but would continue to defend the executive order from “legal challenges” given that the president’s executive order is “fully consistent with the law and promotes legitimate national security interests.”

Trump has given tentative approval to a proposed deal in which Oracle and Walmart could initially own a combined 20 percent of a new U.S. entity, TikTok Global. But Trump also said he could retract his approval if Oracle doesn’t have “total control” of the company.

The White House says the video service is a security risk because the personal information of its millions of U.S. users could be handed over to Chinese authorities.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

From The Epoch Times

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