TikTok loaded phones selling for thousands of dollars, as app stays unavailable in US

Smartphones pre-loaded with TikTok are being sold for thousands of dollars on eBay, Facebook marketplace and other online stores as the Chinese app continues to remain absent on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store in the US, the Associated Press reported. The ByteDance-owned app had become unavailable to users in the US and was also removed from App stores last weekend as it neared a ban in country due to a federal law.

TikTok was given a lifeline when Donald Trump took over as US President and signed an executive order delaying the ban on TikTok by another 75 days. During this period, TikTok must complete a deal that sees ByteDance making a ‘qualified divestiture’.

However, it isn’t clear yet if Trump executive order is even legal with justices remaining unsure if an extension was allowable after the law went into effect on 19 January, Bloomberg reported.

Even Trump loyalist and former VP hopeful Tom Cotton has said that TikTok’s service providers could be opening themselves up for ‘runious liability’. In a post on X, Cotton said, “Any company that hosts, distributes, services, or otherwise facilitates communist-controlled TikTok could face hundreds of billions of dollars of ruinous liability under the law, not just from DOJ, but also under securities law, shareholder lawsuits, and state AGs,”

TikTok loaded phones listed for thousands of dollars:

With TikTok still missing from US app stores, some people in the US are selling phones and tablets loaded with the short video app, along with other ByteDance apps such as Lemon8 and video editor CapCut, for a fortune. One listing on eBay sold a phone for up to $50,000.

Another user was selling his iPhone 14 Plus for $10,000, but told AP that the highest bid he received was $4,550, still well above the phone’s starting price of $799 on Apple’s website.