TikTok back in US: A look at its India journey and what happened after 2020 ban

TikTok was shut down in the US late Saturday as a deadline loomed for its Chinese owners, ByteDance, to sell its US subsidiary to non-Chinese buyers.

But on Sunday, the app restored its service after President-elect Donald Trump promised to issue an executive order delaying the ban. TikTok currently has more than 170 million users in the US.

Trump also posted on his Truth Social platform that the United States should take part ownership in TikTok.

In a statement posted on X, TikTok said: “We thank President Trump for providing the necessary clarity and assurance to our service providers that they will face no penalties providing TikTok to over 170 million Americans.”

TikTok’s India journey and govt ban

Indian users had flocked to TikTok as early as 2017. It allowed India’s millions of regional language speakers to share their content and create digital communities. 

However, in 2020, the video-sharing app faced an exodus of users after the Indian government banned it following clashes between Indian and Chinese military officials along the border.

Citing national security concerns, India banned TikTok along with more than 50 other Chinese apps in June 2020.

Till that time, India was TikTok’s biggest overseas market outside of China, with over 200 million users.

The Indian government had used the ban as precedent to crack down upon other digital platforms they deemed to be a threat, said a report by Time.com citing digital rights activists.

Following the ban, TikTok expanded its global footprint, while national and international tech companies rushed to fill the gap.

Apps such as MX TakaTak, Chingari, and Moj were launched to grab the TikTok users.

Moj, launched in July 2020 by ShareChat, registered more than 1 million downloads within a week.

In November 2020, at least 13 of the top 100 social apps in the Google Play Store in India were TikTok clones, with most of them newly launched, Rest of World reported.

As the competition grew among the local players, global tech giants entered the market.

Alphabet unveiled a beta version of YouTube Shorts and Meta Platforms-owned Instagram launched Reels feature in August 2020.