For ads-free news, click here.
From the Washington Free Beacon: The Department of Justice on Friday sued TikTok and its parent company ByteDance, alleging the Chinese-owned video-sharing platform breached U.S. child privacy laws by allowing millions of children to create accounts without parental consent and unlawfully collecting their personal information.
TikTok has violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), according to the Friday lawsuit, by “knowingly” letting millions of American children under 13 create accounts without parental consent or knowledge, illegally collecting “extensive personal information” from the children, and failing to comply with parents’ requests to delete their children’s accounts.
The lawsuit comes amid a months-long legal battle over a bipartisan law passed by Congress and signed in April by President Joe Biden that would force ByteDance to sell TikTok to a non-Chinese buyer by next year or face a total ban in the United States. Lawmakers grilled TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew in late January over his company’s alleged ties to the Chinese Communist Party, after both Biden and former president Donald Trump voiced national security concerns.
“[The DOJ is] deeply concerned that TikTok has continued to collect and retain children’s personal information despite a court order barring such conduct,” acting associate attorney general Benjamin Mizer said Friday in a statement, referring to a 2019 settlement with the Federal Trade Commission that requires TikTok to take specific measures to comply with COPPA.
In a press release on Friday, the DOJ announced:
According to the complaint, from 2019 to the present, TikTok knowingly permitted children to create regular TikTok accounts and to create, view, and share short-form videos and messages with adults and others on the regular TikTok platform. The defendants collected and retained a wide variety of personal information from these children without notifying or obtaining consent from their parents.
Even for accounts that were created in “Kids Mode” (a pared-back version of TikTok intended for children under 13), the defendants unlawfully collected and retained children’s email addresses and other types of personal information.
Further, when parents discovered their children’s accounts and asked the defendants to delete the accounts and information in them, the defendants frequently failed to honor those requests. The defendants also had deficient and ineffectual internal policies and processes for identifying and deleting TikTok accounts created by children.
The defendants engaged in the above-described conduct despite being subject to a court order barring them from violating COPPA and imposing measures designed to ensure their compliance. TikTok is one of the most popular social media platforms in the world. The defendants’ COPPA violations have resulted in millions of children under 13 using the regular TikTok app, subjecting them to extensive data collection and allowing them to interact with adult users and access adult content. The complaint seeks civil penalties and injunctive relief.
Justice Department Sues TikTok and Parent Company ByteDance for Widespread Violations of Children’s Privacy Laws
🔗: https://t.co/lneVbaoBkZ pic.twitter.com/OUZyKtHZzg
— DOJ Civil Division (@DOJCivil) August 2, 2024
🚨BREAKING🚨
The DOJ is suing Chinese Communist Party controlled TikTok for violating a child privacy law requiring parental consent before collecting information on children under 13 years old.https://t.co/EAMj7lEfkh pic.twitter.com/Eh9eoj8qOV
— Michael Lucci (@Michael7ucci) August 2, 2024
The Dennis Michael Lynch Podcast is available below, with the most recent on top. Never miss an episode. Subscribe to the show by downloading The DML News App or go to Apple Podcasts.
