TikTok: Was Satutrday Shutdown a Stunt?

TikTok’s decision to shut the app down for barely 12 hours – only to restore access to the China-owned app on Sunday after President-elect Donald Trump chimed in – appeared to be a PR stunt meant to stoke a public outcry, policy experts told The NY Post.

“TikTok’s early shutdown either came down to corporate incompetence or a deliberate PR stunt to encourage a manufactured sense of panic,” said Joel Thayer, a DC-based tech lawyer and president of the Digital Progress Institute. “Given it’s waffling, I’m assuming it’s the latter.”

The popular video-sharing app pulled the plug for all US users late Saturday night but began restoring service Sunday afternoon after Trump vowed to “save” TikTok through an executive order Monday that would delay enforcement of the divestiture law requiring parent company ByteDance to sell its stake.

The company thanked Trump “for providing the necessary clarity and assurance to our service providers that they will face no penalties.”

However, the Biden administration had already said it would not enforce the law, and Trump previously signaled ahead of the shutdown that he was against the ban and would “most likely” issue the executive order.

The company’s leadership has acted as “an unsympathetic and disingenuous broker” in its dealings with Congress and the public over the last several years, Thayer said.

“The truth is that, even before Congress enacted the law, the US has told TikTok how to fix its blatant national security concerns for over 5 years and the company did nothing,” he added. “Now, after it attempted to bring bogus First Amendment claims to delay the law’s enforcement and on the eve of its ban, it wants a pity party.”