A US federal judge has blocked the ban issued on short-video sharing app TikTok by the state of Montana. The ban was to come into effect from January 1 but District Judge Donald Molloy issued the block, saying it violated the free speech right of users.
In May, earlier this year, Montana’s Republican-dominated legislature became the first state in the US to pass a complete ban on the app. The state argued that the Chinese government could gain access to user information from TikTok whose parent company ByteDance is based out of Beijing.
However, Judge Molloy said the ban “oversteps state power and infringes on the Constitutional right of users and businesses”. He previously observed that TikTok users voluntarily provide their personal data, despite state officials suggesting the app was stealing it from the users.
Meanwhile, Christian Corrigan, the state’s solicitor general, argued that the ban was less a statement of foreign policy and instead addressed the “serious, widespread concerns” about data privacy.
WATCH | TikTok users file lawsuit to block Montana ban
TikTok goes to court
Notably, soon after Montana Governor Greg Gianforte signed the legislation, affirming the ban, TikTok sued the state.
“We are challenging Montana’s unconstitutional TikTok ban to protect our business and the hundreds of thousands of TikTok users in Montana,” the company said in the court filing.
If the law was implemented, come the New Year’s, the state of Montana was looking to impose fines of $10,000 for each violation by TikTok and additional fines of $10,000 per day if it violates the ban.
TikTok’s growing popularity
TikTok, which has over 150 million American users, has grown quite popular among teenagers. According to the Pew Research Centre, 67 per cent of 13 to 17-year-olds in the United States use TikTok, while 16 per cent of all adolescents use the app fairly daily. TikTok claims that the “vast majority” of its users are over the age of 18.
However, owing to the Chinese connection, the app has become the target of politicians and state authorities, particularly in the US. Montana was being seen as the ideal laboratory to experiment how far the legislators could reach, to ban the app.
But with the federal court putting its foot down and blocking the ban, other Republican states that were eyeing similar legislations would have to hold their horses.
(With inputs from agencies)
