Lawmakers caution that Apple and Google must get ready to take TikTok out of app stores by January 19.

On January 19, Congress critiqued Alphabet, the parent of Google, and Apple by requesting they remove TikTok from their app stores. This follows a ruling issued by the U.S. federal appeals court. In its verdict, the U.S. federal appeals court required ByteDance, the Chinese company to which TikTok belongs, to divest itself from the large social media platform or see it banned in the United States. TikTok contains a hefty population of about 170 million Americans.

Besides, the lawmakers also addressed their appeal to TikTok’s CEO, Shou Zi Chew, to sell the app. They stressed that Congress was taking measures to secure the nation’s security and to protect American users from infiltrations by the Chinese Communist Party.

Lawmakers have said something, but Apple, Alphabet, and TikTok are tight-lipped about the whole situation. ByteDance and TikTok are fighting a legal battle to temporarily block the ruling while seeking a review from the U.S. Supreme Court. The Department of Justice has clarified that if the ban is enforced on January 19, it would not prevent the already downloaded TikTok from being accessed on Apple or Google by various users. However, the said restrictions on any support will cut down TikTok’s usability for a fresh user.

With a statement released so far, TikTok has warned that this ruling would cause the removal of the application from the app stores on the given date. This, it argues, would cut off access to half the population of the Americans who do not currently have the app installed. Republican Senator Josh Hawley expressed hopes that the strict regulation would “cause ByteDance to sell this app, because the law clearly says action should be taken without flexibility.”.

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