Viral video app TikTok won’t be shut down in the U.S. today, regardless of the Trump administration’s original deadline.
According to a report from the Wall Street Journal, the Commerce Department will not enforce the government’s order, which would have basically shut down TikTok on Thursday, due to a preliminary injunction against the move by a U.S. District Court Judge in Philadelphia.
While TikTok itself made legal moves earlier this week to delay the shutdown, the company has three of its own users to thank for the government’s current position. The preliminary injunction cited by the Commerce Department was the result of a lawsuit filed by three popular TikTok creators — Douglas Marland, Cosette Rinab, and Alec Chambers. Each of them has millions of followers on the platform.
The Trump administration argued that TikTok was a national security threat due to its China-based parent company ByteDance’s connection to the Chinese government. An executive order from the president gave TikTok until November 12 to cut ties with ByteDance.
TikTok has attempted to satiate Trump’s demands, partnering with the U.S.-based technology company Oracle. However, that deal has not yet been finalized.
In an interesting turn of events, TikTok announced it was filing a petition with the U.S. Court of Appeals on Tuesday to halt the order. The company claims the Trump administration hasn’t responded to its attempts to make contact for weeks.
If the ban went through, Apple would have been forced to remove TikTok’s app from the App Store. Other online services companies, like Amazon and Google, which provides web hosting for the app, would have been barred from doing business with TikTok as well.
TikTok isn’t safe from the Trump administration’s shutdown order quite yet. However, with Trump’s attention currently focused on trying to overturn an election, which he lost, TikTok seems poised to avert a U.S. ban.