TikTok has gone offline in the US, hours before a new law banning the platform was due to come into effect.
A message appearing on the app for US users said a law banning TikTok had been enacted, meaning “you can’t use TikTok for now”.
The video-sharing app was banned over concerns about its links to the Chinese government and had been given a deadline of 19 January to be sold to an approved US buyer.
President Joe Biden had said he would leave the issue to his successor, Donald Trump. Trump has said he will “most likely” give TikTok a 90-day reprieve from a ban once he takes office on Monday.
“The 90-day extension is something that will be most likely done, because it’s appropriate,” Trump told NBC News on Saturday.
“If I decide to do that, I’ll probably announce it on Monday.”
Users reported the app had also been removed from both Apple and Google’s US app stores and TikTok.com was not showing videos.
“We are fortunate that President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reinstate TikTok once he takes office,” the message displayed after the ban went into force read.
The Supreme Court on Friday upheld the law, passed in April last year, banning the app in the US unless its China-based parent company, ByteDance, sold the platform by Sunday, which it has not done.
TikTok has argued that the law violates free speech protections for its 170 million users in the country.
-BBC