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Countries That Have Banned TikTok & 6 Reasons For Its Ban

Countries That Have Banned Tik Tok

TikTok has become one of the most popular and downloaded Social Media apps of all time. People of every age group can be seen streaming videos on TikTok. But, is TikTok working in your Country? Here is the list of the Countries that have banned TikTok and the reason for banning it.

TikTok is a great app when it comes to user engagement and content quality. Undoubtedly, the app was one of the greatest apps to download but there were certain complications and legal issues that lead to the ban of TikTok in various countries. In this article, we will tell you about the countries that have banned Tik Tok or are in an attempt to ban it. We will also be telling you about the reasons and the legal issues that lead to the ban of Tik Tok.

The countries that have banned TikTok or are in an attempt to ban it are

  • India
  • Pakistan
  • Indonesia
  • Bangladesh
  • United States

TikTok has got amazing stats it has a total of 689 million active users across the globe and 2 billion downloads on all the platforms. The number is huge and so is the popularity but the legal concerns led the app to ban.

Countries That Have Banned TikTok

Further in the article, we will come across the countries that have banned TikTok along with the reasons and the type of bans. So, without wasting much of our time let us start with the article.

1. India – Full Ban

Countries That have Banned Tik Tok - India
Source: India Briefing

India was the first country to permanently ban TikTok. On its ongoing conflict with China, the Indian Government banned almost 230 Chinese apps including TikTok. The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology banned the app on 29 June 2020 saying that these apps were “prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defense of India, security of the state and public order”. The ban was made permanent in January 2021 as a result it cuts 2,000 jobs in India.

2. United States – Attempt To Ban

Countries That have Banned Tik Tok - United States
Source: The Bangkok Post

Former United States President Donald Trump issued an order no. DCPD-202000608, which gave ByteDance 90 days to spin or sell its US TikTok business. He had credible pieces of evidence that make him believe that ByteDance “might take action that threatens to impair the national security of the United States.”  As a result, TikTok filed a lawsuit against trump known as TikTok v/s Trump. Another lawsuit was filed by the Three TikTokers known as the Marland v/s Trump. 

As a result, TikTok was unbanned in the United States with some commerce restrictions. 

3. Pakistan – Full Ban

Countries That have Banned Tik Tok - Pakistan
Source: Adweek

Pakistan became the second country to permanently ban the Chinese app TikTok. Pakistan banned the app, TikTok on 11 October 2020. The reason for the TikTok ban in the country was the type of content being shared on the app. 

Well, the TikTok representatives are in continuous touch with the Pakistani Government and there are hopes that Pakistan will soon Unban the app. If everything goes well.

4. Indonesia – Attempt To Ban

Countries That have Banned Tik Tok - Indonesia
Source: Mobile Media

Indonesia banned the app in July 2020. Although the ban was not permanent. The Government said the ban is due to the sharing of pornographic videos and videos that insult their culture and religion.

The ban was lifted after TikTok removed all the inappropriate videos from its platform. The ban was lifted after ten days and the platform assured the Government that it would never happen again.

5. Bangladesh – Attempt To Ban

Countries That have Banned Tik Tok - Bangladesh
Source: YouTube

Although Bangladesh does not directly ban TikTok. It banned internet access to the user because of the rising pornography and online gambling. After the ban was removed from the Internet, the government wrote to the TikTok platform to remove the videos having adult content.

TikTok responded positively and removed the videos. The government further issued the statement that it will never ban TikTok until people use it correctly.

Countries That have Banned TikTok

Country NameType of Ban
IndiaPermanent Ban
United StatesAttempt to ban
Indonesiaintermittently Blocked
ChinaBanned Overseas Version
PakistanPermanent Ban
Bangladeshintermittently Blocked

Reasons By The Countries That Have Banned TikTok

Let’s have a look at the reasons that led to the fall of the most popular social media site in the world. We will have a look at the countries that have banned TikTok along with the reasons for the ban.

Addiction Concerns

Countries That Have Banned Tik Tok - Addiction
Source: YouTube

Addiction served a major role for the countries that have banned TikTok. According to studies, TikTok was most often used by the younger section of the society and it was observed that the people are watching the 15 seconds video on TikTok repeatedly and watching the same content again and again puts an adverse effect on the attention span. Since most users of the TikTok were children so, it was seen as a hindrance to the learning process.

Content Concerns

Source: The Hack Today

The second reason for the countries that have banned TikTok was the quality of content. They brought to notice the adult content being shared on the app and called the app promoting vulgarity, pornography, and ethics. The countries to ban TikTok for these reasons are India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Indonesia.

Egypt sent five women to two years of imprisonment for sharing videos against the moral ethic of the country on 27 July 2020. Each woman was fined 300,000 Egyptian pounds for the act.

Falsification

Countries That Have Banned Tik Tok - Misinformation
Source: The Economic Times

Media matters for America in January 2020 brought into notice the amount of wrong information being circulated on the platform. The government talks to the TikTok company and TikTok rolled in the feature of reporting the wrong information. But this didn’t work well.

As the pandemic hit India in March 2020, there were rumors on the platform about the covid being fake and urging people to not obey the norms. The government of India found the best solution to stop these rumors. They banned the app. 

I still remember a TikTok video, a person was saying that government will rain sanitizer from the sky with the help of fighter jets so stay at your home from 10 PM to 2 Am.

Privacy Concerns

Countries That Have Banned Tik Tok - Data Leak
Source: Cyclonis

Privacy concerns have always been associated with the TikTok apps. Privacy and data leaks were the most important factors that lead many countries to ban TikTok. India and Pakistan became the first countries that banned TikTok because of privacy concerns. It was observed that TikTok collects usage information, IP addresses, a user’s mobile carrier, unique device identifiers, keystroke patterns, and location data, among other data, and has loopholes in the system that can let any hacker get inside the system and steal the data. Checkpoint research discovered this flaw in January 2020.

A series of events took place and the various authorities came forward with the privacy concerns to TikTok.

Cyberbullying

Countries That Have Banned Tik Tok - Cyber Bullying
Source: YouTube

After privacy concerns, the next reason, countries that banned TikTok gave is cyberbullying. Journalists on various platforms reported that a vast population of children is using the platform so it is easier for sed predators to attack innocent souls. 

Next, the reported reason was the videos on racism and ableism. In the countries where homosexuality is the concern of political agenda have put forward the proposal to ban TikTok as it promotes content in support of the LGBT community.

Micro-Transactions

Countries That Have Banned Tik Tok - Micro Transactions
Source: Teilo

The next reason for countries that banned TikTok was the transactions that children did to buy coins to support their favorite content creators. Countries felt it the unnecessary wastage of money and said children are wasting capital unnecessarily.

Conclusion

Out of all the reasons given the major focus and emphasis by the countries that have banned TikTok was given on the data leak and the privacy concern of the users. Since it was a Chinese app, countries were a bit worried about cybersecurity as nothing can be said about China. 

Frequently Asked Questions

Is there any chance of TikTok getting unbanned?

Well, as of now there are no chances of TikTok getting unbanned but if in the future the company talks with the government and changes its privacy policy then there are chances of removing the ban.

What is the best replacement for TikTok?

There are various apps that can replace TikTok completely but the best replacement for the app is Instagram Reels.

How many users does TikTok have?

TikTok has got amazing stats it has a total of 689 million active users across the globe and 2 billion downloads on all the platforms.

Featured Image Source: Protocol

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