TikTok's newly formed United States joint venture is facing its first major crisis, as a data center power outage triggered a cascading systems failure that disrupted the platform for millions of users while simultaneously sparking explosive censorship allegations. The outage, which began on Saturday evening January 24 at a US-based data center, caused widespread app crashes, login failures, broken video feeds, and uploads stuck in review. Downdetector recorded more than 615,000 user reports over the weekend, with 36,000 complaints logged in just 15 minutes at the peak of the disruption.
The technical failures quickly became entangled with political controversy when users reported that the platform appeared to be suppressing content critical of the Trump administration. TikTok users claimed they were unable to post videos related to Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations and the fatal shooting of two people by federal agents in Minneapolis on Saturday. Creators reported seeing zero views and zero likes on new uploads, while CNBC independently confirmed that direct messages containing the name Epstein triggered an error message stating the content may violate community guidelines. The sensitivity surrounding the Epstein issue relates to the Department of Justice's ongoing release of documents tied to its investigations of Jeffrey Epstein, the late financier and convicted sex offender.
California Governor Gavin Newsom escalated the situation on Monday by announcing a formal investigation into whether TikTok is violating state law by censoring content critical of President Trump. Newsom's press office stated that it had received reports and independently confirmed instances of suppressed content critical of the president. The governor called on the California Department of Justice to determine whether TikTok's conduct violates California law, which mandates large social media companies to maintain transparency about how they moderate or censor content.
TikTok's communications head Jamie Favazza pushed back against the censorship claims, telling NBC News that the concerns were unfounded and that all problems stemmed from the data center power outage. A TikTok USDS Joint Venture spokesperson stated that videos of the Minneapolis incident were available on the platform and had been since Saturday. Regarding the Epstein messaging issue, TikTok said it does not prohibit sharing that name in messages and is investigating why some users experienced the problem. The company told users that their actual data and engagement metrics were safe despite the display errors.
The timing of the crisis has drawn particular scrutiny because it occurred just days after ByteDance finalized the landmark deal to spin off TikTok's US operations into a majority American-owned entity. Under the new ownership structure, American and global investors hold 80.1 percent of the joint venture while ByteDance retains 19.9 percent. Oracle, Silver Lake, and Abu Dhabi-based investment firm MGX each hold a 15 percent stake. Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, a prominent supporter of President Trump, had previously been floated as a potential TikTok buyer.
The entire justification for forcing TikTok's sale was concern over Chinese government influence on content moderation. The fact that the platform now faces accusations of political censorship under American ownership has raised uncomfortable questions about whether the ownership change has genuinely addressed free speech concerns or merely shifted the perceived source of influence. Digital rights organizations have called for greater transparency from the new joint venture about its content moderation policies and algorithmic decision-making processes.
As of Monday evening, TikTok stated that while the network had been recovered, the cascading failure was still being resolved with the data center partner, believed to be Oracle, which declined to comment. Users may continue to notice slower load times, timed-out requests when posting content, and temporarily inaccurate engagement metrics. The incident has underscored the fragility of centralized social media infrastructure and the political volatility surrounding content moderation decisions on platforms used by more than 200 million Americans.
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