TikTok denies report that China is exploring sale of app to Elon Musk amid ban

TikTok has dismissed a report that China is looking at brokering a sale to Elon Musk amid a looming US government ban of the popular app.

TikTok has denied a report that China is looking at potentially facilitating a sale of the popular app to tech billionaire Elon Musk to keep TikTok operational in America amid a looming US government ban.

Bloomberg reported that “Chinese officials are evaluating a potential option that involves Elon Musk acquiring the US operations of TikTok” should an American law goe into effect that would require parent company ByteDance to divest its TikTok stake in the US.

However, Variety reported that the Bloomberg report had been dismissed by TikTok.

“We can’t be expected to comment on pure fiction,” a TikTok rep said, responding to Variety’s request for comment.

Chinese officials are considering selling TikTok’s US operations to billionaire Elon Musk, according to reports. Picture: AFP

It comes as TikTok faces an imminent ban in the US, which the company has been trying to prevent through an appeal to the US Supreme Court.

If that fails, Chinese officials are considering an option where X, the social media platform owned by Mr Musk, would take control of TikTok US and run the business together, the report said.

The proposal was said to be preliminary and no firm decision had been made about how to proceed.

The law that bans TikTok in the US is set to come into effect on January 19.

It comes after TikTok’s free-speech defence against its imminent ban in the US was met with much scepticism in the capital Washington DC on Friday, local time.

The Supreme Court justices indicated they are unlikely to strike down the law to shut down the China-owned platform in saying its banning was not an effort to restrict the First Amendment and that Congress was concerned over its threat to national security.

“Congress doesn’t care about what’s on TikTok,” Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr said aligning the thoughts of both conservative and liberal justices.

“Congress is not fine with a foreign adversary gathering all this data on 170 million Americans. Are we supposed to ignore the fact that its parent company is subject to doing intelligence work for the Chinese government?”

US President-elect Donald Trump filed a brief on December 27, 2024 urging the Supreme Court to pause a law that would ban TikTok the day before his January 20 inauguration if it is not sold by its Chinese owner ByteDance.

Roberts Jr said he didn’t know of any precedent that would call for striking down the ban on free speech grounds.

Justice Elena Kagan appeared to agree.

“This law is targeted at a foreign corporation that doesn’t have First Amendment rights,” she said.

Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh added: “There is a long tradition of preventing foreign ownership or control of media in the United States.”

Those stances came in response to TikTok’s lawyers claiming the proposed ban will be an attack upon the First Amendment.

Supporters of Tiktok livestream in front of the US Supreme Court in Washington, DC. Picture: AFP

“Shuttering the platform will silence the speech of 170 million monthly American users,” they said.

However US lawmakers and The White House say the platform provides Beijing with “vast swathes of data about tens of millions of Americans,” it “could use for espionage or blackmail.”

The appeal on the ban has been fast-tracked and a ruling is likely next week.

If the ban is upheld tech giants such as Google and Apple would not be permitted to allow access to, or distribute or maintain the TikTok app with the risk of punishment of massive fines if they do.

Trump may be able to save the platform in the US after he again indicated he would be open to TikTok being available in America if it was separated from Chinese ownership. The Biden Administration have been unable to work out such a deal.

It is unclear what effect the US ban would have on access to TikTok in Australia. However many experts has surmised that if TikTok is banned in the US on national security grounds, other western democracies are likely to follow suit.

Originally published as TikTok denies report that China is exploring sale of app to Elon Musk amid ban