Frank McCourt’s Project Liberty and other investors have submitted a bid to buy TikTok from China-based ByteDance after a court-ordered divestiture or shutdown.

President Donald Trump told reporters Saturday, "Numerous people are talking to me, very substantial people, about buying" TikTok.

McCourt wants to build a decentralized version of the internet where individual users, rather than tech companies, own the reams of data spawned by their online lives.

The popular platform could be banned on Jan. 19 under a federal law, while many parties have expressed interest in buying the asset.

TikTok is a huge part of American online culture, with millions of users consuming, posting and sharing content every day. But the app’s future in the U.S. is uncertain. If its parent company, ByteDance, doesn’t agree to a sale, TikTok faces a nationwide ban following the passage of a national security law in April.

Frank McCourt said his Project Liberty consortium ... as it's hosted on tech developed by his nonprofit. President Donald Trump said last week he would like the U.S. to have a "50% ownership ...