The law says it will be “unlawful” for entities to “distribute, maintain or update” the app, including its source code, or “provide services” that allow it to continue functioning as it is now. This distribution, maintenance or updates could be done, by law, through mobile application stores accessible in the US or by “providing Internet hosting services.”
“The law really deliberately avoided saying that it was illegal to have the app on your phone,” says Milton Mueller, a professor and co-founder of the Internet Governance Project at the Georgia Institute of Technology, who filed a lawsuit. amicus curiae brief before the Supreme Court in opposition to the ban. “Their intent is to say that no one new can download it from the Apple or Google stores, and no one who has it can update it through those stores,” Mueller says. “There’s nothing in the law that says ‘TikTok, you must block American users,’ which again is interesting.”
If TikTok is removed from the Apple App Store and Google Play Store in the US, it will not be possible to directly install new updates that will add new features, fix bugs within the code, or override security flaws. Over time, that means TikTok will stop working properly. Apple did not respond to WIRED’s request for comment, while Google declined to comment on what it will do if the law goes into effect.
The other objective of the law is to prevent hosting companies from providing services to TikTok, and the definition is quite broad. Hosting companies “may include file hosting, domain name server hosting, cloud hosting, and virtual private server hosting,” the law says. Since summer 2022, when TikTok faced pressure over its Chinese ownership, the company has hosted US user data within Oracle cloud services. Oracle also did not respond to WIRED’s request for comment.
Still, other systems, such as content delivery networks, advertising networks, payment providers, and more, are used as part of TikTok’s infrastructure. The law does not specifically mention these services, but different legal readings could raise questions about whether they help “maintain” or “distribute” the fully operational TikTok service.
Hall says a recent test of TikTok’s website showed 185 domains integrated into the page. “They get code, they get content from that variety of third-party providers and also from their own domains,” he says. “Applications will start to decay and rot as any of the services stop working, things like content delivery networks or services that feel they can’t take the risks of the ambiguous nature of the language or potential law enforcement by part of the incoming administration.
There is one Internet infrastructure player that the ban does not specifically put pressure on: Internet service providers. Countries like Russia and China have developed censorship measures that allow them to block access to entire websites through web browsers. Mueller believes this omission by US lawmakers was likely deliberate, as it avoids establishing a Chinese-style internet firewall. “They knew that an ISP-based blocking and filtering system would obviously be a form of First Amendment restriction,” he says.
Avoid a TikTok ban
While TikTok’s service in the US would likely degrade over time, there are still some potential ways around any ban, both for individuals and potentially for the company itself as well. The effectiveness of these measures will likely depend on how motivated people are to continue using TikTok and what the company decides to do.
“TikTok has 170 million users,” says Alan Rozenshtein, an associate law professor at the University of Minnesota, who favors the law but says it is the “best of a bunch of bad options” related to TikTok. “This law will not prevent everyone from accessing TikTok. I don’t think that was ever the goal of the law. “The law aims to make access to TikTok significantly more difficult.”