TikTok is considering setting up a data center in Australia amid ByteDance’s battle against the ban in the United States.

The popular social media platform TikTok is exploring the possibility of launching a data center in Australia, as reported by The Information. The company, owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, is in talks with providers to support workloads in the Asia-Pacific region.

The plan, which is still in a very early stage, has not been finalized and could take years to materialize.

TikTok has significantly expanded its data center infrastructure in recent years, both to meet growing demand and to try to address regional government concerns about data being sent to China.

In Europe, TikTok operates a data center in Ireland, is building another, and uses a massive facility in Green Mountain, Norway. In the United States, after being one of the largest consumers of data center space in the country, it started moving to Oracle Cloud in hopes of avoiding a ban after former President Trump attempted to block the company.

So far, that effort has failed, as in April the President of the United States declared that ByteDance must sell TikTok in the U.S. or cease operations within nine months.

ByteDance is currently fighting the case in court and claims that no U.S. user data has been sent to China. However, last week, the Department of Justice (DoJ) alleged that they had evidence that data was being stored on servers located in China.

The consideration of a new data center in Australia aligns with TikTok’s efforts to expand its global footprint and reassure local governments about data security and privacy. The company continues to face intense scrutiny in multiple regions as it works to demonstrate its commitment to user data protection and operational transparency.

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