People are listing phones preloaded with TikTok on eBay, Facebook marketplace, and other online storefronts.
ADVERTISEMENTPeople have posted phones with TikTok on them for tens of thousands of dollars online – though it is unclear whether there are many buyers at those prices.
The short-form video app was briefly unavailable to US users over the weekend, but as of Sunday, anyone who had previously downloaded TikTok has been able to use it.
But the app is still not available for download on Apple and Google’s app stores so anyone who didn’t think to get TikTok before Sunday is out of luck.
That’s due to US legislation that passed last year requiring the platform’s Chinese parent company ByteDance to sell the app or face a ban.
As a result, some entrepreneurial spirits are selling phones and tablets that have TikTok and other apps from ByteDance, such as Lemon8 and video editor CapCut.
Questions remain
On eBay, listings could be found for as much as $50,000 (€48,000) or as little as $340 (€326) on Friday.
While it’s not clear how many such phones have sold, the ones selling for hundreds have received the most bids.
TikTok has about 170 million users in the US. The ban does not target individual users, who are technically free to use it as long as they can.
EBay did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the listings on Friday.
Earlier this week, US President Donald Trump directed his justice department to pause enforcement of the ban until early April.
Yet a host of questions remain, including whether Trump has the authority to issue such an order and if TikTok’s China-based parent would be amenable to selling the popular social media platform.
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