Lawmakers in this country debated the ban on one of the most widely used social media platforms. ByteDance, the owner of TikTok, is said to be linked with the Chinese government. Since the ByteDance headquarters are in Beijing, people believe China could control everything the company does. However, this was proved untrue as Tiktok’s headquarters itself is located in Los Angeles and Singapore. Nine months ago, Joe Biden signed the bill to ban TikTok unless it was sold to a US-owned company because it was accused of violating users’ privacy like being able to see location related data and search history. There were many other reasons for this act. Some additional reasons were that TikTok had misinformation about many things and had a bad influence on the young generation. Some theories were also that there was Palestinian supporting content and that this made the Biden administration believe that it would cost them the elections. Nine months later, ByteDance has yet to sell the company.
Many people on campus were devastated by this information. “I am mad, but I am waiting for them to announce whether they are going to extend the ban date,” says Advaith Shankar, an 8th grader.
Sources said that on Monday, January 13, Senator Ed Markey introduced a bill that extended the ban for 270 days, but the bill did not get passed. Donald Trump, the reelected President, took office on January 20th and announced that he would postpone the ban and make a deal with China that would save TikTok from the ban.The day of the ban has already passed. On January 19th, at 7:30 pm, the app became unresponsive. When opened, a page came up telling users that the law had been passed. It also says that President Trump will try to unban the app when he takes office. 12 hours later, Trump extended the ban to October 25 to bargain with ByteDance.
“Even though Instagram reels are way worse than TikTok, that’s the app we might go to when TikTok gets banned,” said Courtney Kwong and Skylar Chau, both 7th graders. Others are also considering moving to apps like Red Note, a new app with a surge of downloads after the TikTok ban.
Even though the ban lasted only 12 hours, it affected many people. TikTok is a huge platform and provides jobs for many people. Without TikTok, lots of people would not be able to support themselves because many small businesses and content creators use TikTok to advertise themselves. The ban has been postponed, but there is still no guarantee that it is safe unless the law is changed or Trump can make a deal with ByteDance. As of February 13, 2025, TikTok was officially unbanned and back in the App Store.
The potential loss of this platform would be very devastating, but in the meantime, we can still use it. But if it does get banned in the US, some are saying they’ll migrate to alternatives like Youtube Shorts or Instagram Reels as well as a few other new apps.
Everyone is further waiting on the future decisions and updates of TikTok and the millions of people that are strongly attached to this app.