What Montana's TikTok Ban Means For Content Creators And Users

Today, Governor Greg Gianforte of the state of Montana signed a bill ordering a complete and total ban on the use of the social media app TikTok within the boundaries of his state. In a public statement, Gianforte said that this measure is part of an effort on the state government's part to "protect Montanans' private data and sensitive personal information from being harvested by the Chinese Communist Party." 

TikTok's parent company, ByteDance, is based in China, which has proven to be a major point of contention for various United States governments. According to the bill itself, the ban would be rendered void in the event that ByteDance sells TikTok's operations to a company "that is not incorporated in any other country designated as a foreign adversary."

Neither the bill nor Gianforte have specified how this new ban will be enforced. Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen has suggested using a similar system to the one that enforces the state's ban on online gambling, though this relies on individuals to actually report violations.

TikTok, for its part, has claimed this ban is a violation of its and its users' First Amendment rights, and it would take measures to push back against it, though it has not stated outright whether it would be filing a lawsuit. TikTok has received support from the American Civil Liberties Union of Montana, which said that the ban will adversely affect the free expression and livelihoods of Montana citizens. 

While the ban was just signed, it is not scheduled to actually go into effect until January 1, 2024, so there will be no immediate impact on TikTok users and content creators based in Montana. Additionally, there is a high probability that TikTok and its allies will file a legal challenge against the bill, which could prevent it from going into effect at all.

Should the bill go into effect, though, its precise language specifies that users would not be the target of its punishments. The bill states that any "entity" that operates or offers downloads for TikTok within Montana would be subject to a $10,000 fine. An "entity," in this case, refers exclusively to either a mobile app store or the TikTok company; the bill outright states that these penalties "do not apply to users of tiktok (sic)."

In the simplest terms, if you were to use the TikTok app in Montana, you would not be punished, but the app store you got it from would be. This presumably means that should you already have TikTok on your mobile device, you could continue to use the app at no danger to yourself. In the event TikTok is made unavailable on app stores in Montana, it could likely still be installed and utilized via sideloading or a VPN. The bill does not specify what entity would be penalized if the app came from a nontraditional source.