Supreme Court upholds TikTok ban planned for Sunday

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Jan 17, 2025 / 17:05 pm (CNA).

The U.S. Supreme Court decided on Friday that a federal ban on the popular Chinese-owned social media application TikTok could go into effect Sunday — but the future of the app remains uncertain as President-elect Donald Trump assumes office the following day.

TikTok, which has more than 100 million active users in the United States, will be banned on Sunday, Jan. 19, if its owners fail to sell the platform. 

TikTok is owned by ByteDance, which is based in Beijing, China, and lawmakers have expressed national security and privacy concerns over the Chinese Communist Party potentially having access to American data.

Although the law goes into effect on Jan. 19, the Associated Press reported that President Joe Biden will not implement any enforcement action on that day, citing an unnamed United States official as its source. 

Trump, who has gone back and forth on whether he supports banning the platform, has been unclear what his plans are when he assumes office.

“The Supreme Court decision was expected, and everyone must respect it,” Trump said in a post on TruthSocial on Friday. “My decision on TikTok will be made in the not-too-distant future, but I must have time to review the situation. Stay tuned!”

TikTok has also generated concerns from child safety advocates who have warned that some children could be exposed to sexually explicit content, targeted by predators, become victims of cyberbullying, or be subjected to content harmful to their mental health.

“If parents are breathing a sigh of relief [amid the upcoming TikTok ban], it would be perfectly understandable, but that doesn’t mean they should be letting their guards down,” Melissa Henson, the vice president of the Parents Television and Media Council, told CNA.

“In anticipation of the Supreme Court upholding the forced sale of TikTok, many teens have already migrated over to new social media platforms; and if TikTok is bought by an American company, it doesn’t necessarily follow that it will become safer for children or teens, as Senate hearings less than a year ago proved,” Henson said.

“The issues that make TikTok dangerous for minors are rife on most — if not all — social media platforms, even those owned and operated by U.S. companies,” she said.

“As parents and grandparents, we need to exercise caution and vigilance when giving children access to smartphones and other devices,” Henson added. “As concerned citizens, we need to continue to push Congress to pass bills that will hold tech and social media companies accountable.”

According to TikTok’s community guidelines, users must be at least 13 years old to access most features, and some content is restricted for users who are younger than 18 years old. Children under the age of 13 can create accounts that are heavily restricted and contain additional safeguards.

In spite of the concerns, TikTok is also used by numerous Catholic apostolates, priests, and evangelists who use the platform to reach young people about Jesus Christ and the Church — some of which have hundreds of thousands of followers.

Father David Michael Moses, who has more than 320,000 followers on TikTok, told the National Catholic Register, CNA’s sister news partner, last week that “there are a lot of lost people on TikTok, and the more lost they are, the more we need to bring them back to the Church.” Although he uses the platform as a tool for evangelization, he said he’d discourage young people from making an account.

“Every bad neighborhood should have a Catholic church and a priest there,” Moses said. “I would not recommend my nieces and nephews all go on TikTok. But just like in a bad neighborhood, there are souls that need to be ministered to, and that is what missionary work is all about.”

In response to the expected ban, many Americans have been turning to other social media apps. One popular alternative is RedNote, another Chinese-owned company that could pose similar national security and privacy concerns if it gains popularity in the United States.

Source: https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/261631/supreme-court-upholds-tiktok-ban-planned-for-sunday