Social media platform TikTok has filed a federal lawsuit in the US to challenge the state of Montana’s new ban on the app.

The state’s legislature this month voted to enact a blanket ban on the app, with governor Greg Gianforte last week signing the bill into a law which prohibits app stores from offering TikTok.

The ban, which is set to take effect on 1 January 2024, would see TikTok along with Google, Apple and any other app store operators fined up to $10,000 per day if they carry the banned app – though it remains unclear how the ban would be enforced as these companies do not have the capacity to operate state-by-state app stores.

The ban is the first of its kind in the US, and is an unprecedented clampdown on free speech from the deep red state.

Bytedance-owned TikTok however has now fought back, and has argued that the ban violates First Amendment rights of the company and its users. The law would not impose penalties on individual TikTok users, with the company claiming that it has hundreds of thousands of active accounts in the state of 1.1 million residents.

The lawsuit also argues that the ban is preempted by federal law on grounds that it intrudes upon matters of exclusive federal concern, and that it violates the Commerce Clause of the US Constitution which limits the authority of States to enact legislation that unduly burdens interstate and foreign commerce.

The lawsuit also reiterated TikTok’s stance that it "has not shared, and would not share, US user data with the Chinese government, and has taken substantial measures to protect the privacy and security of TikTok users."

The news comes after five TikTok users in the state filed a lawsuit in federal court seeking to block the ban.

A spokesperson for Montana attorney general Austin Knudsen, who has been charged with enforcing the law and was named in the suit, said: “We expected legal challenges and are fully prepared to defend the law that helps protect Montanans’ privacy and security.”

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