Company
Date Published
Author
João Tomé
Word count
572
Language
English
Hacker News points
69

Summary

The US ban on TikTok went into effect on January 19, 2025, with a clear impact on DNS traffic to TikTok-related domains starting after 03:30 UTC. The ban was part of the "Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act," which ordered ByteDance to divest due to alleged security concerns. Following the ban, DNS traffic for TikTok alternatives such as RedNote surged in the US and other countries including Mexico, Canada, UK, Germany, and France. The surge was consistent with apps like RedNote rising on top of the Android and iOS App Stores. On January 20, 2025, after a partial shutdown, TikTok announced it was beginning service restoration following assurances from President-elect Donald Trump, and DNS traffic began to recover slightly.