National Security and Social Media: The Case Of Tiktok

The chapter analyses the “TikTok case” before US courts. On April 24, 2024, President Joe Biden signed into law the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, a bill that received bipartisan support in Congress to ban TikTok, the platform owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, giving it a year to be sold. A few weeks later, TikTok filed a petition in the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit against Attorney General Merrick Garland. They argued that the law is unconstitutional and violates the First Amendment, which protects free speech. The US government defended the bill’s constitutionality, asserting that it raised no First Amendment issues as it focused on threats to national security. Some data of American TikTok users were stored in China, and the company collected information on users’ opinions on sensitive topics. According to the US government, there is a real risk that the Chinese government could access American users’ data and use the app to spread propaganda or influence elections. On January 17, 2025, the Supreme Court upheld the TikTok ban, ruling that the Act did not violate the First Amendment. However, President Trump repeatedly delayed enforcement. On September 24, 2025, Trump approved a deal to establish a U.S.-based version of TikTok, granting the U.S. and China 120 more days to finalize the terms. The case is intriguing as it highlights how a nation’s security is increasingly intertwined with the use of major social media platforms.