In extremis.

US users will be able to continue to download TikTok and its updates, at least for now, thanks to a Washington judge, who on Sunday, September 27 blocked the suspension of the app ordered by the Trump administration in name of national security.

Donald Trump signed a decree in early August to ban the very popular social network, which belongs to the Chinese group ByteDance, unless it falls into the fold of an American company.

A few hours before the government's decision to ban the application from downloading platforms took effect, Judge Carl Nicholas ruled in favor of TikTok, which had filed an appeal on September 18. 

"Legal pitfalls"

The magistrate, appointed by Donald Trump in 2019, on the other hand refused to suspend the total ban on the application on American soil, scheduled for November 12.

The reasons for his decision are under seal, in order to protect potentially confidential information, but are due to be released on Monday once the two parties agree.

"We are satisfied that the court has agreed with our legal arguments and prevented the implementation of the ban," responded TikTok.

The Commerce Ministry said it would comply with the judge's ruling, but fully intended "to vigorously defend the presidential decree against legal pitfalls."

"It's a community"

In a telephone hearing Sunday morning, lawyers for TikTok said blocking downloads of the app would be unconstitutional and violate the right to free speech, especially in the run-up to the November 3 presidential election.

"TikTok is much more than an application, it is the modern version of the public forum, it is a community, it is a means of communication (...) all the more important in times of pandemic", argues lawyer John Hall.

"If the ban goes into effect, it is as if the government is preventing two-thirds of the country from coming to the agora."

The platform also assured that it would cause irreparable damage in terms of growth, while it gained some 424,000 new American users per day at the beginning of the summer.

And stopping updates would ironically “erode security” for the current 100 million US users, Hall said.

For its part, the government considers ByteDance as a "spokesperson" for the Chinese Communist Party and says it wants to prevent new users from being exposed to the risk of their data being looted by China.

Donald Trump has long accused TikTok of spying on its users for the benefit of Beijing, without evidence.

Since his decree, negotiations, invective at the top and twists and turns in the courts have been linked.

If the negotiations are not successful, a complete ban on the network's activities on American soil could come into force from November 12, the Treasury warned.

The creation of a new company

TikTok last weekend confirmed an agreement to create a new company, TikTok Global, with Oracle as a technology partner in the United States and Walmart as a business partner.

There would also be a stake of 12.5% ​​from Oracle and 7.5% from Walmart.

The Americans would hold four of the five seats on the board.

But the finalization depends on the goodwill of the American president and the Chinese government.

"We are continuing our ongoing dialogue with the government to finalize this project, to which the president has given his preliminary approval," TikTok said on Sunday evening.

With AFP

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