Overview
- The Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel wrote on Friday that the 2022 law banning TikTok from government devices no longer applies and that employees may download the app subject to individual agency rules.
- ByteDance completed a January 2026 transfer of U.S. user data and operations to TikTok USDS, a joint venture 80.1% owned by U.S. and global investors with ByteDance keeping a 19.9% minority stake.
- TikTok USDS has said it will retrain the recommendation algorithm on U.S. data and host code and user data in Oracle's U.S. cloud as technical safeguards for the platform.
- Investors tied to competing firms have sued, arguing the divestiture does not meet the 2024 law's terms; the federal government has asked courts to dismiss the case and the litigation remains pending.
- About 200 million Americans use TikTok and the DOJ opinion could shift how agencies, Congress, and courts handle national security rules, with agencies still able to block the app for productivity or security reasons.