United States of America: Issued ruling in a lawsuit challenging the TikTok ban on state-owned devices (Coalition for Independent Technology Research v Abbott)

On 12 December 2023, the District Judge of the Western District of Texas rejected the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University’s lawsuit challenging Texas' ban on TikTok use by state government employees. According to the Judge, the ban was a reasonable restriction due to data protection concerns and the ban does not obstruct the use of TikTok on personal devices, as long as it is not done on state networks. The Directive ordering all public institutions in Texas to ban the installation and use of the mobile application Tiktok for their employees was implemented on 15 February 2023. The State agencies were required to implement a policy on the use of the application following the strategy and a model plan adopted by the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas Department of Information Resources.