If it seems like TikTok has been around forever, that’s probably because it has, at least if you’re measuring internet time. Now the question is whether it will last for a long time and if so, in what form?
Starting in 2017, when the Chinese social video app merged with its rival Musical.ly, TikTok has grown from a niche teen app into a global trendsetter. Of course, according to US officials, it is also emerging as a potential national security threat.
On April 24, President Joe Biden signed a law that will require TikTok’s parent company ByteDance to sell or shut down its US owner within a year. TikTok and its China-based parent company, ByteDance, filed a lawsuit against the US, claiming that security concerns are overstated and that the law should be struck down because it violates the First Amendment.
The Supreme Court on Friday unanimously upheld a federal law banning TikTok, shutting down the popular short-form video service in the US just hours before the ban was to begin.
Here’s how TikTok got to this point:
March 2012
ByteDance was founded by entrepreneur Zhang Yimin in China. Its first hit product is Toutiao, a personalized news aggregator for Chinese users.
July 2014
Startup Musical.ly, best known for an eponymous app used to post short lipsyncing music videos, is founded in China by entrepreneur Alex Zhu.
July 2015
Musical.ly rose to #1 in the Apple App Store after a design change that allowed the company logo to appear when users shared their videos.
2016
ByteDance launches Douyin, a video sharing app for Chinese users. Its popularity led the company to introduce a version called TikTok for overseas audiences.
November 2017
ByteDance acquired Musical.ly for $1 billion. Nine months later, ByteDance merged it with TikTok.
Powered by an algorithm that encourages binge-watching, users begin sharing a variety of videos on the app, including dance moves, kitchen food preparation and various “challenges” to perform, record, and post. Which range from serious to satirical.
February 2019
Rapper Lil Nas This incident has sparked a wave of TikTok videos from music artists who suddenly see TikTok as an important way to reach fans.
TikTok has settled federal charges of violating US child-privacy laws and agreed to pay a $5.7 million fine.
September 2019
Washington stateT reports that while photos of Hong Kong’s democracy protests and police action are common on most social media sites, they are strangely absent on TikTok. The same story reports that a TikTok post with the #trump2020 tag was viewed more than 70 million times.
The company insists that TikTok content moderation in the US is not responsible and says the app is a place for entertainment, not politics.
The Guardian has reported on internal documents allegedly detailing how TikTok prevents its moderators from discussing topics sensitive to China, such as the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and subsequent massacres, Tibetan independence or links to the sanctioned religious group Falun Gong. Gives instructions to remove videos or limit their access.
October 2019
US politicians have begun to raise concerns about TikTok’s influence and have called for a federal investigation of its Musical.ly acquisition and a national security investigation of TikTok and other Chinese-owned apps. According to news reports, the investigation will begin in November.
December 2019
The Pentagon recommends that all US military personnel remove TikTok from all personal and government-issued phones. Some services ban apps on military-owned phones. In January, the Pentagon banned the app from all military phones.
According to data from analytics firm SensorTower, TikTok has become the second most downloaded app in the world.
May 2020
Privacy groups have filed a complaint alleging that TikTok is still violating US child-protection laws and violating the 2019 settlement agreement. It says the company “takes security issues seriously” and continues to improve security measures.
TikTok has appointed former Disney executive Kevin Mayer as its chief executive in an apparent effort to improve its US ties. The mayor resigned after three months.
July 2020
India banned TikTok and dozens of other Chinese apps in response to the border confrontation with China.
President Donald Trump says he is considering banning TikTok in retaliation for China’s alleged handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.
August 2020
Trump has issued a sweeping but vague executive order banning US companies from any “transactions” with ByteDance and its subsidiaries, including TikTok. Several days later, he issued a second order demanding that ByteDance divest itself of TikTok’s US operations within 90 days.
Microsoft has confirmed that it is exploring the possibility of acquiring TikTok. The deal is never completed; There is no such proposal from Oracle and Walmart either. Meanwhile, TikTok has sued the Trump administration for alleged violations of due process in its executive orders.
November 2020
Joe Biden has been elected President. He doesn’t offer new policy on TikTok and won’t take office until January, but Trump’s plan to force the sale of TikTok is beginning to unravel anyway. The Trump administration has extended the time limits imposed on ByteDance and TikTok and eventually scrapped them altogether.
February 2021
President-elect Joe Biden postponed legal cases related to Trump’s plan to ban TikTok, effectively blocking them.
September 2021
TikTok has announced that it has more than one billion monthly active users.
December 2021
A wall street journalisml The report found that the TikTok algorithm could flood teens with harmful content, such as videos advising extreme dieting, which is a form of eating disorder.
february 2022
TikTok has announced new rules to prevent the spread of harmful content like viral rumors and promotion of eating disorders.
April 2022
“The Unofficial Bridgerton Musical”, a project created as a TikTok project by two fans of the Netflix show, won a Grammy for Best Musical Theater Album.
According to SensorTower data, TikTok has become the most downloaded app in the world, overtaking Instagram.
June 2022
BuzzFeed reports that China-based ByteDance employees have repeatedly accessed non-public information of TikTok users, based on leaked recordings from more than 80 internal TikTok meetings. TikTok responded with a vague comment reflecting its commitment to security that does not directly address the BuzzFeed report.
TikTok has also announced that it has transferred its user data to US servers managed by American tech firm Oracle. But that doesn’t stop fresh concerns among US officials about the risk of Chinese access to US user data.
December 2022
FBI Director Christopher Wray has raised national security concerns about TikTok, warning that Chinese officials could manipulate the app’s recommendation algorithms to conduct influence operations.
ByteDance also said it fired four employees who accessed data from journalists at BuzzFeed News and The Financial Times while attempting to track leaks of confidential material about the company.
February 2023
The White House has given federal agencies 30 days to ensure that TikTok is removed from all government-issued mobile devices. Both the FBI and the Federal Communications Commission warned that ByteDance could be sharing TikTok user data with China’s authoritarian government.
March 2023
Lawmakers questioned TikTok CEO Shaw Zi Chew in a six-hour congressional hearing, where Chew, a Singapore native, attempted to refute claims that TikTok and ByteDance are tools of the Chinese government.
January 2024
TikTok said it was restricting a tool that some researchers use to analyze popular videos on the platform.
March 2024
A bill to ban TikTok or force it to be sold to an American company is gaining momentum in Congress. TikTok brings dozens of its creators to Washington to ask lawmakers to step back, while pushing for changes the company has made to protect user data. TikTok also harasses lawmakers by sending notifications to users encouraging them to “speak out now” or risk being banned from TikTok; After this the users flooded the Congress offices with calls.
The House of Representatives passed a bill to ban or sell TikTok.
April 2024
The Senate followed suit and sent the bill to President Biden, who signs it.
May 2024
TikTok and its Chinese parent company ByteDance are suing the US federal government to challenge a law that would force the sale of ByteDance’s stake or face a ban, saying the law is unconstitutional.
June 2024
Former President Donald Trump joined TikTok and began posting campaign-related content.
July 2024
Vice President Kamala Harris joined TikTok and also started posting campaign-related content.
December 6, 2024
A federal appeals court panel unanimously upheld a law that could have banned TikTok, dealing a crushing defeat to the popular social media platform as it fights for its survival in the US. The panel of judges rejected the company’s challenge to the law, finding it a violation of the First Amendment.
December 27, 2024
President-elect Donald Trump asked the Supreme Court to block a potential TikTok ban from being implemented until his administration can find a “political solution” to the issue.
January 17, 2025
The Supreme Court unanimously upheld a federal law banning TikTok unless it is sold by its China-based parent company, holding that the national security threat posed by its ties to China outweighs the app’s ability to limit speech. Overcomes concerns of limiting effect on January 19, 2025.
January 18, 2025
TikTok users in the United States were blocked from watching videos on the popular social media platform hours before the federal ban took effect.
“A law banning TikTok has been passed in the US,” a message on the app said. “Unfortunately, this means you can’t use TikTok right now.”
The company’s app was also removed from major app stores, including those operated by Apple and Google, while its website told users that the short-form video platform was no longer available.
January 19, 2025
Soon after the app was shut down to US users, Trump said he would issue an executive order after taking office to give TikTok an extension so it can remain online.
A few hours later, TikTok restored service to users in the United States and said Trump had “provided our service providers with the necessary clarity and assurances that they will not face any penalties for providing TikTok to the more than 170 million Americans “