The U.S. Supreme Court decided on Wednesday to hear a bid by TikTok and its China-based parent company ByteDance to block a law intended to force the sale of the short-video app by Jan. 19 or face a ban on national security grounds.
The justices did not immediately act on an emergency request by TikTok and ByteDance, as well as some of its users who post content on the social media platform, for an injunction to halt the looming ban, opting instead to hear arguments on the matter on Jan. 10.
The challengers are appealing a lower court's ruling that upheld the law. TikTok is used by about 170 million Americans.
Congress passed the measure in April. The Justice Department had said that as a Chinese company, TikTok poses "a national-security threat of immense depth and scale" because of its access to vast amounts of data on American users, from locations to private messages, and its ability to secretly manipulate content that Americans view on the app. TikTok has said it poses no imminent threat to U.S. security.
TikTok and ByteDance asked the Supreme Court on Dec. 16 to pause the law, which they said violates free speech protections under the U.S. Constitution's First Amendment.
The companies said that being shuttered for even one month would cause TikTok to lose about a third of its U.S. users and undermine its ability to attract advertisers and recruit content creators and employee talent.