Late on Saturday night, 18 January, TikTok went offline in the United States.
Less than two hours before its ban was scheduled to go into place, visitors to the app were greeted with the message:
“Sorry, TikTok isn’t available right now. A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the U.S. Unfortunately, that means you can’t use TikTok for now.”
But the app told its 170 million US users that it might not be gone for long and could even be back as early as Monday.
The company posted this in a pop-up message to users late Saturday night:
“We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reinstate TikTok once he takes office. Please stay tuned!”
This follows President-elect Trump said he will “most likely” delay a ban on TikTok for 90 days after he takes office on Monday.
However in an interview with NBC News on Saturday he said he has not made a final decision.
The app was due to be banned on Sunday, 19 January following a court upholding a ban previously passed by Congress and signed into law in April by President Joe Biden.
The law prevents American companies from hosting or serving content for the Chinese-owned social media platform unless it sells itself to a buyer from the United States or one of its allies.
