UK government speaks out over future of TikTok in country as US set to ban app tomorrow

The UK government has spoken out over the future of TikTok as the US are set to ban the app tomorrow (19 January).

Any scroll through videos right now would make you think there’s been a huge death, as creators share ‘funeral’ content and Americans savour every last moment.

And in some ways, it’s a pretty big loss to people who use the app daily or have made a living from posting videos on there.

But with TikTok in its final hours over in the states, some Brits are worrying the same thing would end up happening in the UK. However, it looks like we have nothing to be concerned about.

The US Supreme Court rejected TikTok's appeal. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

The reason why the platform is getting blocked in the US is because of a law President Joe Biden signed last April, giving TikTok a deadline of tomorrow to separate its US business from parent firm ByteDance.

This was because the US government sees the China-based company’s control of TikTok as a national security threat.

And earlier this week, the US Supreme Court rejected TikTok’s appeal and unanimously upheld the law banning the app.

Seeing all the content coming from America as people prepare for it to be wiped up, Brits have been worrying the same is to come for us.

However a UK Government spokesperson said: “This is a matter for the US government. There are no plans to introduce a TikTok ban in the UK.

“We engage with all major social media companies to understand their plans for ensuring the security of UK data and to ensure they meet the high data protection and cyber security standards we expect.”

Tiktok isn't going anywhere for us. ( Jaap Arriens/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

While President Biden’s administration has signalled that it would not enforce the law, TikTok has said it will have to ‘go dark’ unless there are assurances that the US government will not enforce a shut down.

TikTok released a statement late on Friday saying ‘statements issued today by both the Biden White House and the Department of Justice have failed to provide the necessary clarity and assurance to the service providers that are integral to maintaining TikTok’s availability to over 170 million Americans’.

“Unless the Biden Administration immediately provides a definitive statement to satisfy the most critical service providers assuring non-enforcement, unfortunately TikTok will be forced to go dark on January 19,” the statement said.

Well, given the way things are looking, RIP US TikTok (long live UK TikTok…).