US judge blocks restrictions on TikTok; calls Trump's actions "arbitrary and capricious”

A federal judge of the United States has blocked the Trump administration from imposing a ban on TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance. According to the reports by ANI, the court on Monday, December 7 said, "For the foregoing reasons, Plaintiffs' Motion for a Preliminary Injunction is granted as to all the prohibitions listed in the Commerce Identification. An Order will accompany this Memorandum Opinion”. The judge described Trump’s action as "arbitrary and capricious”. 

As per the BBC report, the Chinese company had said in November that the US government had not provided any feedback for at least two months. However, now as the incoming US President Joe Biden will be taking over on January 21, 2021, as the transition process has already begun, TikTok among other Chinese firms will be eager to understand US’ approach. However, the president-elect has not yet clarified his stance on the video-sharing app that the outgoing Trump administration has denounced over ‘national security concerns’. 

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Trump administration and TikTok

Trump had restricted any US transactions with the Chinese company, ByteDance saying it “threatens to allow the Chinese Communist Party access to Americans' personal and proprietary information”, the court ruled against it and granted TikTok’s request for a preliminary injunction. US President’s order dated August 14 had pushed ByteDance to sell its operations in America by November 12. This was followed by the potential deal of the video-sharing app with Silicon Valley giant Oracle. But the deadline was extended till November 27 and just a day before it ended CFIUS extended it further to December 4.

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The Trump administration has repeatedly noted that TikTok can allow China’s Communist Party to track the location of federal employees as well as contractors. TikTok, however, has denied such accusations and stressed that it has never handed over information to the Chinese government and would deny even when asked. ByteDance-owned TikTok has been challenging Trump’s executive order saying that the US President did not follow the traditional process of evidence that the video-sharing app posed an actual threat. The company has also reportedly said that its servers where the information of Americans is stored are located in the United States and Singapore while also questioning the need for a ban since negotiations are underway over its ownership.

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(Image Credits: AP)