Supreme Court denies stay order on TikTok ban

Supreme Court is in no mood to give any relief to TikTok after Madras High Court directed the state government to prohibit downloading of Bytedance-owned short video app.

The apex court has denied putting a stay order on banning TikTok by Madurai bench of the Madras High Court. The bench comprising of justices N Kirubakaran and SS Sundar had passed an interim order effective from April 3.

The order highlighted the fact that TikTok and other short video apps are vulnerable to underage children and may expose them to a sexual predator.

While the Madras High Court will hear the matter on ex parte ad interim order on April 16, Supreme Court has listed the matter for hearing on April 22. Last week, the apex court had already refused TikTok's plea for an urgent hearing over the ban of short video application.

The strict decision by the Supreme Court also leaves no room for Bytedance's argument of banning TikTok will hurt free speech rights in the country.

Responding to the latest crackdown, TikTok said that it has faith in the Indian Judicial system and it will continue to abide by the guidelines mentioned in Information Technology Rules, 2011.

According to Belle Baldoza, Director of Tiktok’s Global Communication, the company has placed an easy reporting mechanism to report content that violates our terms of use and community guidelines.

The Chinese company also claimed to have removed 6 million videos violating the guidelines and has introduced an age-gate feature to keep away underage users from the platform.

Meanwhile, TikTok has started TikTok’s Safety Centre and resource pages to tackle bullying activities as well as act as an advisory for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls in 10 languages.

The development was reported by ET.