Oracle May Hold TikTok’s Future in Its Hands

The company is one of the app’s leading server providers, managing the data centers where billions of 40-second videos are stored.

TikTok’s immediate future may rest in the hands of a tech company that has largely avoided the spotlight: Oracle. The company is one of the app’s leading server providers, managing the data centers where billions of 40-second videos are stored.

“It could become a digital roadblock that prevents people from getting access to the content, if they make the decision to shut it down, which is uncertain,” said Bob O’Donnell, founder of TECHnalysis Research, a market research firm.

An Oracle spokesman didn’t respond to repeated requests for comment. The company, which has close ties to the incoming Trump administration, has said in the past that its sales and profits would be hurt by a TikTok ban.

Mr. O’Donnell said there were a few ways the process could work. First, he suggested that TikTok could issue a software update this weekend that would prevent the app from sending traffic to Oracle’s servers. If that doesn’t happen, then Oracle may need to block traffic from the app, so that TikTok videos couldn’t be retrieved from its data centers.

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