President-elect Donald Trump says he wants service providers like Apple and Google to put TikTok back online in the US, and proposed creating a joint venture where the US owns 50 percent of the app.

President-elect Donald J. Trump said on Sunday that he would issue an executive order to stall a federal ban of TikTok, just hours after major app stores removed the popular social media site and it stopped operating for U.S. users.

TikTok went dark for American users in an unprecedented display of the U.S.-China divide over technology and national security.The app started halting service Saturday night for 170 million users in its most important market shortly before a law took effect requiring it to shed its Chinese ownership or close in the U.