The United States Justice Department sued TikTok and parent company ByteDance on Friday for failing to protect the privacy of children on the Chinese-owned app. The social media app has been accused of illegally collecting children’s data without seeking permission from parents.
The latest lawsuit against TikTok comes as the Joe Biden-led US government continues its crackdown on the social media platform. According to news agency Reuters, the Biden administration has claimed that TikTok violated the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, which requires services aimed at children to obtain parental consent to collect personal information from users under age 13.
The US government said that the company knowingly permitted children under the age of 13 to create and use TikTok accounts and often failed to honour parents’ requests to delete the accounts of their children, as reported by The New York Times. The lawsuit was filed in a federal court in Southern California.
In the lawsuit, it was claimed that TikTok and the parent company ByteDance violated both the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, a law that calls for restrictions on the online tracking of children, and a 2019 agreement between TikTok and the US government, according to which the company pledged to notify parents before collecting children’s data and remove videos from users under 13 years old, The New York Times reported.
The suit asked for the court to fine the companies over the violations. It was aimed at putting an end "to TikTok's unlawful massive-scale invasions of children's privacy."
Representative Frank Pallone, the top Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Committee, said the suit "underscores the importance of divesting TikTok from Chinese Communist Party control. We simply cannot continue to allow our adversaries to harvest vast troves of Americans’ sensitive data," as quoted by Reuters.
TikTok Says Allegations Based On ‘Factually Inaccurate’ Events
On Friday, TikTok said it disagrees with the allegations and claimed that they relate to past events and practices that are factually inaccurate or have been addressed. "We are proud of our efforts to protect children, and we will continue to update and improve the platform," the social media platform said.
According to the DOJ, the social media app knowingly permitted children to create regular accounts and then create and share short-form videos and messages with adults and others on the regular TikTok platform, as reported by Reuters.
The US alleged that for many years millions of children in the country under the age of 13 have been using TikTok, and the site "has been collecting and retaining children's personal information."
"TikTok knowingly and repeatedly violated kids’ privacy, threatening the safety of millions of children across the country,” said FTC Chair Lina Khan, whose agency in June referred the case to the Justice Department, as quoted by Reuters. The FTC is seeking penalties of up to $51,744 per violation per day from TikTok for improperly collecting data.