TikTok outage linked to the Minneapolis shooting? Users make bizarre Alex Pretti claims

TikTok users reported app issues on January 25. Speculation arose regarding a link between the outage and the Minneapolis shooting.

Updated on: Jan 26, 2026, 06:35:57 IST

By Shirin Gupta

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Millions of TikTok users across the United States reported issues with the app on January 25, including problems loading videos, missing comments and broken feeds. This came at the time when public attention was focused on the Minneapolis shooting involving federal agents killing 37-year-old Alex Pretti on Saturday, January 24.

TikTok is not working for several users across the US. (UnSplash)

The overlap prompted speculation on social media about whether the TikTok outage was linked to the Minneapolis shooting and content moderation.

Are the incidents linked? Here's what TikTok users are saying

On Sunday, TikTok users began reporting significant problems with TikTok. Feeds failed to load, and user accounts started to reset or show no comments, followers or messages.

Multiple reports surfaced indicating connectivity and access issues across major U.S. cities. Many users described their feeds as "frozen" and reported an inability to upload new videos.

Over 35,000 outage complaints peaked overnight, according to the DownDetector website. By early Sunday afternoon, that figure had dropped to 4,600. Videos that failed to load and had zero views were reported by users.

Many users on X are claiming that the TikTok glitch has something to do with “Alex Pretii's murder.”

Emily Grindstaff wrote on X, highlighting her problems posting a video about ICE agents, “TIKTOK IS SUPPRESSING VIDEOS ABOUT ALEX PERETTI’S MURDER! I posted a video over 8 hours ago talking about ICE agents murdering a man in Minnesota & my video has ZERO views. Never has a video Ive posted on TikTok gotten less than a few hundred within hours. This is intentional.”

Another user @jiyoonisms referenced that she is unable to repost videos from Aaron Parnas about the ICE shooting incident in Minneapolis and wrote, “Tiktok went down for two hours last night and you now can’t repost Aaron Parnas. Then I went to go look up Minneapolis and guess what, you cannot repost anything related to Minneapolis or Alex Pretti. This is insane, this is why Tiktok randomly stopped working.”

Lincoln Square, a self-claimed media and news company on X, reposted a post claiming that TikTok is censoring anti-Trump and anti-ICE content. They wrote, “We can confirm this.”

However, these are just speculations, and no credible evidence connects the technical glitch to the Minneapolis shooting incident. HT.com cannot independently verify these claims.

Recent transfer of ownership to the US

TikTok announced on Friday, January 23, that its Chinese owner, ByteDance, had struck a deal with American investors to avoid the possibility of a ban on TikTok in the US.

The company negotiated contracts with significant investors, including Oracle, Silver Lake, and MGX, to create the new TikTok U.S. joint venture.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Shirin Gupta
Shirin Gupta is a content producer with the Hindustan Times. She covers everything between politics, entertainment and sports at the US desk. Shirin got interested in political journalism during her time as a web editor at her college newspaper NCC News in Syracuse when she first started seeing the effects of national politics in life of her fellow colleagues. Shirin has worked on a wide range of fast-moving and developing stories locally when she was at NCC editing accessible reports for the audience. Her current role requires her to track real-time updates, verify information and present balanced coverage across diverse beats. Covering US politics from an international newsroom perspective has further deepened her understanding of how domestic decisions can have far-reaching global consequences. With a keen interest in international affairs, Shirin continues to build her expertise in geopolitics, policy shifts, and cross-border developments. She aims to learn and evolve her reporting in matters of geopolitics and international issues. Outside the newsroom Shirin writes about books and music for her personal blog. She is an avid consumer of pop culture and reveres literature.Read More

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