Abdulkadir Günyol
22 January 2025•Update: 23 January 2025
ISTANBUL
The social media war between the US and China continues after Chinese-owned app TikTok was banned and reopened hours later.
Former US President Joe Biden signed the Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, after it passed with major bipartisan support in Congress. It stated that TikTok would be banned on Jan. 19 if it is not sold to an American buyer.
President Donald Trump, however, signed an executive hours after his inauguration to delay the TikTok ban for 75 days in a surprising turn, as he tried to ban the app during his first term.
As the app reopened, users reported that a pop-up notification appeared on the opening page read that “as a result of President Trump’s efforts, TikTok is back in the US.”
TikTok is a parent company of the Chinese firm ByteDance, which is owned by global institutional investors, such as Blackrock, ByteDance founders, and its employees. It said that “it is not owned or controlled by any government,” according to the TikTok US Data Security website.
TikTok boasts 170 million users in the US and is one of the five most popular social media platforms in the country, NBC said in a recent report.
US users flocked to the Chinese app, Xiaohongshu, in response to the ban, Reuters reported.
The app was renamed “rednote” in all lowercase letters in the Google and Apple app stores to cater to the soaring foreign demand. Arrivals from TikTok call themselves “TikTok refugees” on rednote.
More than 3 million US users signed up on rednote in the last week alone, as the number joining the app surged at an unprecedented rate, Reuters reported.
US, China’s mutual bans
The trade war between the US and China started during Trump’s first term, when the US increased tariffs on solar panel and aluminum imports from China in March 2018 to lessen the trade deficit.
The war evolved into a technology war, following restrictions on Chinese company Huawei, which was followed by other chip restrictions.
Trump restricted US firms from sending equipment to China to be used in advanced chip production.
The tech war, especially on the matter of chips, deepened under Biden, as Congress passed the CHIPS and Science Act under his term, calling for incentives to encourage chip production in the US, providing $52 billion in direct funding to support the domestic semiconductor industry.
Meanwhile, China banned the products of US-based digital tech companies. Social media platforms like YouTube, WhatsApp, Instagram, X and Facebook, and even Google, cannot be accessed in mainland China.
Billionaire Elon Musk, owner of X, said Jan. 19, the day the TikTok ban took effect, that he has been “against a TikTok ban for a long time, because it goes against freedom of speech.”
“That said, the current situation where TikTok is allowed to operate in America, but X is not allowed to operate in China is unbalanced. Something needs to change,” he added.
*Writing and contributions by Emir Yildirim
