TikTok has announced that its service is 'back to normal' following a week-long outage that disrupted the app for users in the United States. The platform experienced significant issues after its US operations were transferred to American ownership late last month, ending years of threats of a ban due to alleged Chinese control.
Users reported seeing old posts resurface in their feeds and new posts failing to reach any audience. The outage coincided with a movement to delete the app and a surge in popularity for competitors, amid controversy over the new owners' links to Donald Trump and allegations of political content suppression.
TikTok confirmed that the 'significant outage' was caused by a winter storm that knocked out power at a 'primary US data centre operated by Oracle', a company involved in the takeover. The power outage led to network and storage issues affecting tens of thousands of servers, impacting core features such as content posting, discovery, and real-time display of likes and view counts.
In a statement, TikTok said: 'Our teams worked around the clock with Oracle to ensure a safe and full restoration of systems. We're sorry about the issues experienced by our US community.' The company thanked users for their patience and understanding.
