First Amendment attorneys contested the Texas law, initiating a lawsuit on behalf of college professors. These educators claimed that the app’s prohibition had jeopardized their work by impeding access.
On Monday, a federal judge in Texas upheld a ban preventing state employees from using TikTok, the Chinese-owned short-form video app, on government devices and networks. The challenge to the ban was initiated by lawyers representing the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University in July. The institute filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Coalition for Independent Technology Research, which includes Texas college professors. These professors argued that their work suffered when access to TikTok was blocked on campus Wi-Fi and university-issued computers.
In his ruling, Judge Robert L. Pitman of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas acknowledged that the ban restricted public university faculty from using state-provided devices and networks for TikTok-related research and teaching. However, he deemed it a “reasonable restriction” considering Texas’ concerns about data privacy. The ban, specific to state employees, was noted by the judge as narrower than a broader ban planned in Montana, temporarily blocked by a federal judge.
The Knight First Amendment Institute revealed that universities in over 20 states have imposed TikTok bans due to national security threats associated with the Chinese-owned ByteDance. The Institute, working pro bono on free speech cases, advocates for exemptions for university faculty in Texas and other states affected by TikTok bans.
Over the past year, global lawmakers, including those in the United States, Europe, and Canada, have intensified efforts to limit TikTok access, citing concerns about potential Chinese government access to sensitive user data and the risk of misinformation through TikTok’s content recommendations. The Chinese government’s ability to demand data from Chinese companies under secrecy laws has fueled these concerns.
As of now, neither the Knight First Amendment Institute nor TikTok has issued an immediate comment on the court’s decision.