TikTok banning upheld in Texas

NEW YORK — A federal judge in Texas upheld the state’s TikTok ban on official devices and networks, rejecting a challenge brought by an organization that claimed the restrictions violated the First Amendment.

The lawsuit, filed in July by The Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, had argued that the ban on official devices — which extends to public universities — was impeding academic freedom and compromising on the ability of professors to teach and do research about the social media app.

The Knight Institute brought the complaint on behalf of the Coalition for Independent Technology Research, a group of academics and researchers who study technology’s impact on society. Their lawsuit also cited a member of the group — and a professor at the University of North Texas — who they said couldn’t assign students certain in-class work and had to suspend some research projects because of the ban.

In his decision Monday, Judge Robert Pitman of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, wrote that the state’s ban on official devices is not a restraint on speech.

Pitman also said while he agrees that the ban prevents certain university faculty from using state-provided devices and networks to do research and teach about TikTok, the ban was also a “reasonable restriction on access to TikTok in light of Texas’ concerns.”

Western governments have expressed worries that the popular social media platform, owned by Beijing-based ByteDance, could put sensitive data in the hands of the Chinese government or be used as a tool to spread misinformation.