TikTok 周日对其 1.7 亿美国用户“关闭”后再开
【中美创新时报2025 年 1 月 19 日编译讯】（记者温友平编译）周日（19日），TikTok 在对其 1.7 亿美国用户“关闭”后于中午重新开放。之前，即将上任的特朗普政府和拜登政府周六就 TikTok 的状态以及是否会禁止该服务展开了激烈争论，此前该视频应用程序表示，当一项联邦法律生效时，它将被迫在周日“关闭”。《纽约时报》记者大卫·麦凯布18日下午对此作了下述报道。
当选总统唐纳德·特朗普告诉 NBC 新闻，他“很可能”会在周一上任后找到一种方法给该公司延期 90 天，“因为这是合适的。”
周六早些时候，白宫新闻秘书称 TikTok 声称将关闭服务是“噱头”。TikTok 在周五晚些时候发表的声明中呼吁拜登政府向苹果、谷歌和其他科技公司保证，他们不会因在美国提供 TikTok 服务而受到惩罚。
白宫新闻秘书卡琳娜·让-皮埃尔 (Karine Jean-Pierre) 在一份声明中表示：“我们已经明确而直接地阐述了我们的立场：实施这项法律的行动将由下一届政府负责。”
尽管反复无常，但 TikTok 的命运仍不明朗。
该公司的声明是其最新一次尝试，旨在向政府施压，要求其暂缓执行一项法律，该法律已于周五得到最高法院的支持，该法律将从周日开始有效禁止其服务。
该法律规定，除非 TikTok 被其中国母公司字节跳动出售给非中国所有者，否则应用商店和主要云计算提供商不能向美国消费者提供 TikTok。去年，立法者出于对 TikTok 的中国所有权对国家安全构成威胁的担忧而提出了这项措施。
TikTok 没有详细说明周日会发生什么，包括它是否会自愿关闭或只是停止运行，因为它将无法访问保持在线所需的服务。该应用程序声称拥有 1.7 亿美国用户。
拜登政府此前曾表示，联邦官员不会根据该法律立即对苹果、谷歌和其他公司采取行动。
总统乔·拜登于 4 月签署了 TikTok 禁令法案，该法案在两党支持下通过国会。议员们表示，北京可能会向字节跳动施压，要求其提取美国用户的敏感数据或影响 TikTok 内容以服务于中国政府的利益。
TikTok 表示，中国政府在该公司没有任何作用，它已经花费了数十亿美元来解决美国的安全问题。字节跳动总部位于北京，受中国控制。
周五，最高法院接受了政府以国家安全为由颁布该法律的理由，多数意见指出“TikTok的规模和易受外国对手控制的敏感性，以及该平台收集的大量敏感数据。”
副司法部长丽莎·莫纳科在最高法院裁决后发表声明称，这一过程将“随着时间的推移”逐步展开。让-皮埃尔表示，执法将落在周一就职的特朗普政府身上。
TikTok表示，这些言论不足以让其他公司相信，如果它们继续分发和维护该应用程序，它们不会触犯法律。禁令生效后，这些公司可能面临每个在美国境内访问该应用程序的TikTok用户高达5,000美元的罚款。
该公司表示：“拜登白宫和司法部今天发表的声明未能向服务提供商提供必要的清晰度和保证，而这些对于维持TikTok对1.7亿多美国人的可用性至关重要。”
失去这些用户群将是重大损失，但这并不是 TikTok 遭受的最大损失。2020 年，TikTok 在拥有 2 亿用户的印度被禁。与美国一样，印度当局以国家安全问题为由，决定禁止 TikTok。
特朗普此前曾表示支持 TikTok，并正在考虑发布行政命令，允许 TikTok 继续在美国运营。
但目前尚不清楚特朗普的行政命令是否能有效阻止禁令。法律专家表示，他可以指示司法部不要执行法律，或在一定时间内推迟执行，但如果在法庭上受到质疑，这样的行政命令会如何发展尚不确定。
特朗普还可能找到买家，如果达成可行的交易，他将可以将截止日期延长 90 天。但目前还没有出现明确的买家。
周六，特朗普接受 NBC 新闻采访时，尚不清楚他考虑的 90 天延期期限是多久。
“我们必须仔细考虑。这是一个非常大的情况，”他告诉 NBC。如果他确实同意该应用延期 90 天，“我可能会在周一宣布，”他补充道。
本文最初发表于《纽约时报》。
题图：当选总统唐纳德·特朗普表示，他“很可能”会给 TikTok 延期 90 天。Gabby Jones/Bloomberg
附原英文报道：
TikTok says it will ‘go dark’ on Sunday for its 170 million American users
By David McCabe New York Times,Updated January 18, 2025, 3:14 p.m.
President-elect Donald Trump said he would “most likely” give TikTok a 90-day extension.Gabby Jones/Bloomberg
WASHINGTON — The incoming Trump administration and the Biden administration went back and forth Saturday over the status of TikTok and whether a ban of the service would take place, after the video app said that it would be forced to “go dark” on Sunday when a federal law takes effect.
President-elect Donald Trump told NBC News that he would “most likely” find a way to give the company a 90-day extension once he takes office Monday “because it’s appropriate.”
Earlier Saturday, the White House press secretary called TikTok’s claim it would go dark “a stunt.” TikTok, in a statement late Friday, had called on the Biden administration to assure Apple, Google and other technology companies that they would not be punished for delivering TikTok’s services in the United States.
“We have laid out our position clearly and straightforwardly: Actions to implement this law will fall to the next administration,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement.
Despite the back and forth, TikTok’s fate was still unclear.
The company’s statement was its latest attempt to pressure the administration to grant it a reprieve from a law, upheld by the Supreme Court on Friday, that would effectively ban its service starting Sunday.
The law says that app stores and major cloud computing providers cannot deliver TikTok to U.S. consumers unless the company is sold by its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to a non-Chinese owner. Lawmakers introduced the measure last year over fears that TikTok’s Chinese ownership poses a threat to national security.
TikTok did not detail what would happen Sunday, including whether it would voluntarily shut itself down or simply cease to function because it would lose access to services it needs to stay online. The app claims 170 million U.S. users.
The Biden administration had earlier signaled that federal officials would not immediately take action against Apple, Google and the other companies under the law.
President Joe Biden signed the TikTok ban bill into law in April after it passed Congress with bipartisan support. Lawmakers said Beijing could pressure ByteDance to extract sensitive data on American users or influence TikTok content to serve the Chinese government’s interests.
TikTok has said the Chinese government has no role in the company and that it has spent billions of dollars to address U.S. security concerns. ByteDance has headquarters in Beijing and is subject to China’s control.
On Friday, the Supreme Court accepted the government’s national security rationale for the law, with the majority opinion pointing to “TikTok’s scale and susceptibility to foreign adversary control, together with the vast swaths of sensitive data the platform collects.”
Lisa Monaco, deputy attorney general, said in a statement after the Supreme Court’s ruling that the process would play out “over time.” Jean-Pierre said that enforcing the law would fall to the incoming Trump administration, which takes office Monday.
TikTok said that those comments were not enough to satisfy other companies that they would not run afoul of the law if they continued to distribute and maintain the app. Those companies could face penalties as high as $5,000 for each TikTok user who accesses the app inside the United States after the ban takes effect.
“The 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,” the company said.
The loss of that user base would be significant, but not the biggest TikTok has suffered. In 2020, it was banned in India, where it had 200 million users. As in the United States, authorities in India cited national security concerns for their decision against TikTok.
Trump has previously indicated his support for TikTok and was considering an executive order to allow TikTok to continue operating in the United States.
But it’s unclear if an executive order by Trump could effectively halt a ban. Legal experts said he could direct the Justice Department not to enforce the law, or delay enforcement for a set period, but how such an executive order would fare if challenged in court is uncertain.
Trump could also find a buyer, which would allow him to extend the deadline by 90 days if a viable deal is on the table. But no clear buyers have emerged.
It was unclear what 90-day extension Trump was weighing when he spoke with NBC News on Saturday.
“We have to look at it carefully. It’s a very big situation,” he told NBC. If he does grant the app a 90-day extension, “I’ll probably announce it on Monday,” he added.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
