By Björn Jeffery, SvD Tech Brief. Published in Svenska Dagbladet on 17 January 2025.
The deadline expires this weekend. But will one of the world’s most popular apps really disappear? SvD’s tech analyst Björn Jeffery explains what happens when the espionage-accused TikTok is banned in the United States.
Yes — at present it looks that way. The US law was voted through in April 2023 and set a final deadline of 19 January, the day before Donald Trump is sworn in as president. The law does not actually regulate whether TikTok (or similar apps) may exist or not, but is aimed at its Chinese ownership. TikTok’s Chinese parent company ByteDance could therefore sell the app and thereby allow it to continue on the American market — but so far it has chosen not to do so.
There are still a few lifelines left for TikTok. The first and most important was the US Supreme Court, which considered whether the law violated the country’s freedom of expression — the so-called “first amendment.” TikTok appealed all the way to this level. On Friday, however, the definitive ruling came: the Supreme Court would not block the ban. The decision was expected, and the legal process is now formally concluded.
The second lifeline is whether some form of sale can be arranged. The law allows for a temporary three-month extension if such a deal is in progress but has not yet been completed. ByteDance has previously said a sale is out of the question, but that was when the outlook for TikTok looked brighter. Now that the Supreme Court route has not worked out, it is not impossible that they will apply for such an extension to explore a potential sale after all.
Several names have been mentioned as potential buyers or interested parties — among them Elon Musk, Bobby Kotick (the former CEO of gaming company Activision Blizzard), and Frank McCourt, a billionaire linked to the political movement Project Liberty. In recent days, even the YouTuber MrBeast has expressed interest in buying TikTok.
The third lifeline is the incoming president, Donald Trump. He is a self-styled dealmaker and has said he is interested in finding a solution — some form of partnership or sale. One can also imagine him issuing a so-called “executive order,” a mechanism that allows the president to prevent the law from being enforced in practice. TikTok’s CEO Shou Zi Chew has been invited to Trump’s inauguration, which can be seen as a positive signal.
Time is, however, extremely tight — and even if a new solution is found, there may be a gap during which TikTok disappears for users for a while.
The law has been known about for a long time, but many users assumed it would have no practical effect. The hope was that a sale or something similar would allow the service to continue running as before.
Over the past week it has become clearer that the end may be near. As a signal to American politicians, TikTok users have begun downloading and using the Chinese app Xiaohongshu instead. The app — previously virtually unknown in the US — reached the top spot in Apple’s App Store after the influx of TikTok users became so large. Xiaohongshu literally means “little red book,” which is itself a nod to Mao’s Little Red Book. If the original purpose of the law was to reduce the Chinese Communist Party’s influence on American citizens, it has at least temporarily backfired.
Setting aside the peculiar phenomenon of Xiaohongshu, TikTok’s users will quickly need to find a new, stable platform to use. Many use the service commercially and make their living by creating video clips, and businesses rely on it for marketing.
Most likely, the majority will switch to Instagram’s Reels — a product that is essentially a copy of TikTok. It has achieved considerable success, but has not fully broken through for the most prominent creators. Now there is an opportunity for Meta — Instagram’s owner — to restart with this influential group. Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram, has already announced that they are working on improvements to video editing and other tools used by creators.
Update: President Donald Trump subsequently approved a deal on TikTok in the United States through an executive order, with Trump telling reporters at the White House that Chinese President Xi Jinping had also agreed to the arrangement.
