Some quick-thinking entrepreneurs have figured out how to take advantage of the short period when TikTok was not available in the United States.
They are selling phones that already have the app on them for a lot of money online. On January 19, the app was made unavailable to users in the United States just hours before a deadline.
This happened after ByteDance, the company that owns TikTok, decided to shut down the app in the U.S. ByteDance had to either sell TikTok to a firm based in the United States or face a ban because of national security concerns. As a result of this closure, TikTok’s 170 million users in the United States were unable to access the app.
Nevertheless, the outage was brief. On January 20, President Donald Trump put a stop on the ban from going into effect, allowing ByteDance until early April to either negotiate or comply with the terms.
Even however, the program was not available for download in app stores in the United States, which caused a brief shortage. This was the case even if TikTok was promptly restored for existing users.
This shortage of availability created an opportunity for resellers to make a profit, resulting in a dramatic increase in the number of phones and devices that arrive with TikTok pre-installed.
One offering on eBay stood out as being particularly expensive. It offered a brand-new Apple iPhone 16 Pro Max that came preinstalled with TikTok for $50,000 or “Best Offer.”
The listing attracted a lot of interest in a short amount of time, with almost 80 potential purchasers watching the device. Although this specific listing may be at the high end of the price range, there are other devices that come with TikTok already installed that are being sold for a few hundred dollars.
Supreme Court Considers Landmark Case on Public Funding for Religious Charter School
Some dealers even advertise phones that have live TikTok accounts, while others just offer the app loaded but not connected to any particular user account.
The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act is the legal backdrop to the rise in TikTok-loaded smartphones. If this law is applied, it might make it illegal for app stores like Google or Apple, or even web-hosting firms, to distribute or support TikTok.
Southern California Braces for Winter Storm with Fires, Flood Watches, and Snow
However, the rule is expressly aimed at corporations such as app retailers, not individuals.
This results in a one-of-a-kind situation in which merchants are attempting to take advantage of the app’s unexpected scarcity and high demand by making a quick profit off of a temporary gap in the app’s availability in the United States.
About The Author
