The new owners of U.S. TikTok—American investors to satisfy safety concerns about the app created by the Chinese technology company ByteDance—have an explanation for ongoing problems experienced by users beginning Sunday morning.
For context, MAGA Republican President Donald Trump infamously ranted about the app and vowed to permanently ban it from the United States during his first term in office.
After many U.S. users reported an inability to upload new videos to the platform or to new videos from other users, including those from users outside the U.S., people accused the platform of censorship.
Others pointed to issues with the algorithm that determines what content they see. During initial stages of use of most social media, users see random content until an algorithm "learns" their preferences based on their reactions and engagement, then serves up that content.
Some U.S. TikTok users claimed their algorithm was "reset" to resemble a new user's blank slate. Others stated a new algorithm that bolstered pro-Trump, pro-MAGA, or pro-right wing content.
In response, TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC posted Monday on X:
"Since yesterday we’ve been working to restore our services following a power outage at a U.S. data center impacting TikTok and other apps we operate. We're working with our data center partner to stabilize our service. We're sorry for this disruption and hope to resolve it soon."
Later in the day they posted an image of their official statement captioned:
"An update on our work to restore and stabilize TikTok."
The statement read:
"We're continuing to resolve a major infrastructure issue triggered by a power outage at one of our U.S. data center partner sites. While the network has been recovered, the outage caused a cascading systems failure that we've been working to resolve together with our data center partner."
"What this means for your Tik Tok experience:"
"• You may notice multiple bugs, slower load times, or timed-out requests, including when posting new content."
"• Creators may temporarily see '0' views or likes on videos, and your earnings may look like they're missing. This is a display error caused by server timeouts; your actual data and engagement are safe."
"Thank you for your patience and understanding as we work to bring TikTok back to full capacity as soon as we can."
On Tuesday, the account added:
"We've made significant progress in recovering our U.S. infrastructure with our U.S. data center partner. However, the U.S. user experience may still have some technical issues, including when posting new content. We're committed to bringing TikTok back to its full capacity as soon as possible. We'll continue to provide updates. Thanks for your patience."
The U.S. TikTok account's posts don't allow comments from the public, so users of the platform have taken their responses elsewhere, like the technology subReddit.
Users weren't buying what the new owners were selling.
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Redditors called TikTok's power outage explanation a lie to cover up pro-Trump censorship and shadow banning.
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TikTok USDS Joint Venture LLC is helmed by Oracle and a group of investors friendly to the Trump administration. The group took over TikTok in the United States last week, which raised concerns about censorship and privacy.
The group promised to route U.S. TikTok user data through Oracle-owned data centers and launch a new version of TikTok’s algorithm specific to U.S. user activity.
TikTok was accused of becoming another social media platform, like Elon Musk's X, that promotes the White supremacist and Christian nationalist agenda of the Trump administration while spying on users to identify and silence critics.
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