Greater than six months after TikTok was briefly banned, we nonetheless do not know precisely what its destiny within the US shall be. However we do have new perception into the authorized wrangling that has allowed Apple, Google and different platforms to proceed to assist the app.
When you bear in mind, TikTok was solely “banned” for a matter of hours shortly earlier than President Donald Trump took workplace in January and delayed enforcement of the legislation. The app’s service was promptly restored January 19, 2025, however the app did not return to Apple and Google’s app shops till February 13. Reporting on the time advised the businesses had lingering issues about potential legal responsibility for working afoul of the Defending Individuals from Overseas Adversary Managed Purposes Act.
Again in February, Axios and others reported that the Justice Division had given “assurances” to tech platforms that they would not be penalized for violating the legislation. Now, we all know precisely what Legal professional Basic Pam Bondi instructed the companied as letters despatched to Apple, Google, Amazon, Oracle and different companies have been made public. The letters had been disclosed in a Freedom of Info Act Request made by Tony Tan, a software program engineer and Google shareholder suing the search large for not complying with the TikTok ban.
In a letter dated January 30, 2025, Bondi tells Apple and Google that “the President has decided that an abrupt shutdown of the TikTok platform would intrude with the execution of the President’s constitutional duties to care for the nationwide safety and overseas affairs of america.” It goes on to state that Apple and Google “could proceed to offer providers to TikTok … with out incurring any authorized legal responsibility.”
A followup later dated April 5, 2025 (the day after Trump gave TikTok one other 75-day reprieve), Bondi instructed the businesses that “the Division of Justice can be irrevocably relinquishing any claims america may need had in opposition to” them “for the conduct proscribed within the Act in the course of the Coated Interval and Prolonged Coated Interval, with respect to TikTok and the bigger household of ByteDance Ltd. and TikTok, Inc. purposes lined underneath the Act.”
The letters may be learn in full under.
The legislation has now been paused thrice since Trump took workplace. Earlier this week, he stated that particulars about TikTok’s new possession could possibly be made public in “about two weeks.”
