Could TikTok be banned in the UK? What US bill means and where else the app is blocked

TIKTOK could be ‘banned’ in the US if its Chinese parent company refuses to sell it over fears the relationship is a national security threat.

Concerns over the social media app escalated last year among governments in the US, Canada, the European Union (EU) and the UK over its pervasive data collection and ties to China.

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On 13 March, the US House Representatives passed a bill demanding the app be sold by owner ByteDance in six months.

The app has amassed more than 1.8billion users worldwide since it launched nearly eight years ago.

TikTok has called cascading government concerns “misguided and based on fundamental misconceptions” and has always refuted claims that it has ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Could TikTok be banned in the UK?

There are concerns over security and data privacy at the Chinese-owned app.

While TikTok is not banned for the average user in the UK, it was announced last year that the app would be banned on government staff phones.

Prime minister Rishi Sunak has previously hinted at mirroring country-wide bans, saying the UK will “look at what our allies are doing”.

TikTokers sign up for a considerable amount of data collection when they create an account on the platform, such as:

• The device and operating system you’re using
• How long you watch a post for
• What categories you like
• Where you’re located
• The keystroke rhythms you have when you type

In 2021, Ireland’s data protection watchdog launched an investigation into “transfers by TikTok of personal data to China and TikTok’s compliance with the GDPR’s requirements for transfers of personal data to third countries”.

However, Ireland will not be following the US in trying to ban the platform, according to Taoiseach Leo Varadkar.

Is TikTok banned in the US?

TikTok is not currently banned in the US.

However, Washington has floated the idea of a country-wide ban of TikTok – unless it is sold to a different company – since last year.

The US also blocked all federal employees from having the app on government-issued phones in 2023.

Both the FBI and the Federal Communications Commission have warned that parent company ByteDance could share TikTok user data with China’s authoritarian government.

If ByteDance does not sell the company in six months, the app will be banned for all 150million US users.

Where else is TikTok blocked or restricted?

Alongside the US, the UK, EU, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Taiwan have banned people working for government agencies from having TikTok on staff devices for a year now.

In 2020, India banned the platform and dozens of other Chinese apps, after warning that user data was being mined and profiled “by elements hostile to national security and defence of India”.

India made the ban permanent in January 2021.

Authorities in Pakistan have imposed at least four temporary bans on the platform since October 2020, citing concerns that it promotes immoral content.

However, the country row back on its decision each time.

Indonesia temporarily banned the app in 2018 for similar reasons, but lifted the ban a week later after the app agreed to censor certain content.

Afghanistan’s Taliban banned TikTok in 2022 on the grounds of protecting youths from “being misled”.

In August 2023, Somalia said the country was planning on restircting access to TikTok, alongside Telegram and online gambling site 1XBet.

Nepal announced a ban on TikTok late last year.