The logos for TikTok and RedNote, known in China as Xiaohongshu. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Even as the fate of social media platform TikTok hangs in the balance in the U.S. — with a ban being postponed for a few weeks by President Donald Trump — Xiaohongshu, a Chinese platform resembling TikTok, has welcomed “refugees” from the beleaguered service, and many users have stayed on even. Now, a trickle of Indian users are also joining the platform, five years after TikTok’s ban drove most creators and users to rival American platforms like Instagram and YouTube.

The new user base has opened a rare channel of exchange between Indian and Chinese users, and offers a glimpse into Chinese prejudices and perceptions of India. “A friend in China said it was interesting,” Neenu Vinod, a Mumbai-based user who joined after the deluge of American “refugees” joined the platform, said. “I’m getting a mix of American Tiktokers and Chinese people who use the app. They’re helping us with certain things” like the lingo to use and tips for providing translations, she said.

Harish Meena, a self-styled TikTok “oldie”, said last week in his first post that he liked that the app focused on “giving more content and information rather than being an entertainment source”. The post quickly gained over 50 likes, even though Mr. Meena barely has a third as many followers. 

Vanshika Kumar, who has gained a small but sizable following of Chinese users soon after posting, said that users in that country “watch the Mahabharata, read the Gita, and many are also fans of Bollywood movies,” while some “have a bit of a biased or racist view, probably because they’ve learned about India through skewed media”. 

Ms. Kumar joined a year ago, and has watched as a new cohort of Indian users — mostly young adults — join the platform. “It’s refreshing to use a new form of social media,” she said.

Indeed, content by Chinese users about India have sometimes veered into outright prejudice, with some users questioning India’s state of development and urban cleanliness. But there are also users, commenting under posts by Chinese tourists posting from India for instance, who marvel at their “helpful” and “competent” Indian colleagues and classmates in multinational firms and universities abroad. 

Sometimes, Indian users join the conversation. Under a professionally cut Mandarin video explainer on India’s ambitions — which included a surprisingly detailed segment on Centre–State relations and their fiscal facets — one user from Uttar Pradesh defended (in Chinese, of course) the State’s law and order situation. 

Xiaohongshu doesn’t appear to be following any of the social media regulations that American firms have got accustomed to. Even the one-time passcodes to create an account are delivered over WhatsApp, not over SMS. However, amid a thaw in Indo-Chinese relations, it is far from given that the app will be embroiled in the en masse bans of Chinese apps that occurred after the 2020 border skirmishes. 

For users, the geopolitics are far from focus. Ms. Vinod, for instance, cited the degradation of other social media platforms like X, formerly Twitter. Citing the noxious turn content on X has taken, she has started spending more time on Bluesky, the X alternative largely seen as a haven for liberal-leaning microbloggers. “It would be good if all of us get into these apps and get rid of Facebook and Twitter,” Ms. Vinod said.

The U.S. Supreme Court refused to rescue TikTok on Friday (January 17, 2025) from a law that required the popular short-video app to be sold by its Chinese parent company ByteDance or banned on Sunday (January 19, 2025) in the United States on national security grounds — a major blow to a platform used by nearly half of all Americans.

The justices ruled that the law, passed by an overwhelming bipartisan majority in Congress last year and signed by Democratic President Joe Biden, did not violate the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment protection against government abridgment of free speech. The justices overturned a lower court’s decision that had upheld the measure after it was challenged by TikTok, ByteDance and some of the app’s users.

“There is no doubt that, for more than 170 million Americans, TikTok offers a distinctive and expansive outlet for expression, means of engagement, and source of community. But Congress has determined that divestiture is necessary to address its well-supported national security concerns regarding TikTok’s data collection practices and relationship with a foreign adversary,” the court said in the unsigned opinion.

The court added that “we conclude that the challenged provisions do not violate petitioners’ First Amendment rights.”

The Supreme Court acted speedily in the case, having held arguments on January 10, just nine days before the deadline set under the law. The case pitted free speech rights against national security concerns in the age of social media.

Also read: U.S. TikTok users flock to other apps

TikTok is one of the most prominent social media platforms in the United States, used by about 270 million Americans – roughly half the country’s population, including many young people. TikTok’s powerful algorithm, its main asset, feeds individual users short videos tailored to their liking. The platform presents a vast collection of user-submitted videos, often under a minute in duration, that can be viewed with a smart phone app or on the internet.

China and the United States are economic and geopolitical rivals, and TikTok’s Chinese ownership for years has raised concerns among American leaders. The TikTok fight has unfolded during the waning days of Biden’s presidency – Republican Donald Trump succeeds him on Monday (January 20, 2025) — and at a time of rising trade tensions between the world’s two biggest economies.

The Biden administration has said the law targets control of the app by a foreign adversary, not protected speech, and that TikTok could continue operating as-is if it is freed from China’s control.

During arguments in the case, Justice Department lawyer Elizabeth Prelogar said Chinese government control of TikTok poses a “grave threat” to U.S. national security, with China seeking to amass vast quantities of sensitive data on Americans and to engage in covert influence operations. Prelogar said China compels companies like ByteDance to secretly turn over data on social media users and carry out Chinese government directives.

TikTok’s immense data set, Prelogar added, represents a powerful tool that could be used by the Chinese government for harassment, recruitment and espionage, and that China “could weaponize TikTok at any time to harm the United States.”

The law was passed last April. The Biden’s administration defended it in court. TikTok and ByteDance, as well as some users who post content on the app, challenged the measure and appealed to the Supreme Court after losing on Dec. 6 at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

Mr. Trump’s opposition to the ban represents a reversal in stance from his first term in office when he aimed to prohibit TikTok. Mr. Trump has said he has “a warm spot in my heart for TikTok,” opining that the app helped him with young voters in the 2024 election.

In December, Mr. Trump asked the Supreme Court to put the law on hold to give his incoming administration “the opportunity to pursue a political resolution of the questions at issue in the case.” But while Mr. Trump has vowed to “save” TikTok, many of his Republican allies supported the ban.

Mike Waltz, Mr. Trump’s incoming national security adviser, said on Thursday (January 16, 2025) the new administration will keep TikTok alive in the United States if there is a viable deal. Waltz said the incoming administration would “put measures in place to keep TikTok from going dark,” and cited a provision in the law allowing for a 90-day extension if there is “significant progress” toward a divestiture.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said on Thursday that TikTok should be given more time to find an American buyer and that he would work with the Mr. Trump administration “to keep TikTok alive while protecting our national security.”

TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew will attend Mr. Trump’s inauguration on Monday (January 20, 2025), seated among other high-profile invitees.

TikTok has said the law endangers the First Amendment rights not only of it and its users, but also of all Americans. TikTok has said that the ban would hit its user base, advertisers, content creators and employee talent. TikTok has 7,000 U.S. employees.

Noel Francisco, the lawyer for TikTok and ByteDance, told the Supreme Court that the app is “one of America’s most popular speech platforms,” and said that the law would require it to “go dark” unless ByteDance executes a qualified divestiture.

TikTok plans to shut U.S. operations of the app on Sunday (January 19, 2025) barring a last-minute reprieve, people familiar with the matter told Reuters on Wednesday.

Mr. Francisco said the U.S. government’s real target with this law is speech — specifically a fear that Americans could be “persuaded by Chinese misinformation.” But the First Amendment leaves that up to people of the United States, not the government, Mr. Francisco said.

The law bars providing certain services to TikTok and other foreign adversary-controlled apps including by offering it through app stores such as Apple and Alphabet’s Google, effectively preventing its continued U.S. use absent divestiture.