Protesting to the ban, TikTok issued a statement saying that the state-wide ban “infringes on the First Amendment rights of the people of Montana”
Starting January 2024, TikTok users in the US state of Montana will no longer be able to access the short video platform due to a statewide ban on its use. Signing the ban on Wednesday, May 17th, Montana Governor ‘Greg Gianforte’ made Montana the first US state to ban TikTok on all personal devices.
A wider ban would help “our shared priority to protect Montanans from Chinese Communist Party surveillance,” said Governor Gianforte while talking about the ban.
Protesting the statewide ban, TikTok issued a statement saying that the state-wide ban “infringes on the First Amendment rights of the people of Montana”.
Adding onto its statement, TikTok said that their platform is used by “hundreds and thousands of people” in the state of Montana. Addressing these users in Montana, TikTok said that:
“We want to reassure Montanans that they can continue using TikTok to express themselves, earn a living, and find community as we continue working to defend the rights of our users inside and outside of Montana.”
It’s being reported that this new statewide ban will stop app stores from offering TikTok in the state of Montana but the application will continue to work on devices which already have them installed in the first place.
Before officially announcing this new statement, lawmakers in Montana passed a bill on banning TikTok on personal devices, receiving a majority 43 of the 54 votes.
Montana becomes first state to completely ban TikTok pic.twitter.com/5qfIOHUF1w
— Dexerto (@Dexerto) May 17, 2023
Lawmakers in Montana are aggressively against the use of TikTok in their state, just last year in December, the state banned the Chinese application on all government owned devices as well.
These repeated bans and regulatory moves against TikTok came after the application got alleged of being involved with the Chinese government. It was predicted that the application which is prevalent in American society is being used to steal a lot of their data and is potentially a threat to their national security.
TikTok, however, has denied all of these claims, stating that it does not have any connections to the Chinese and that it respects its user data and privacy.
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