(The Center Square) – The Department of Justice sued TikTok and its parent company, China-based ByteDance, on Friday for alleged violations of an online privacy law for children.
"The Department 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 in a statement. "With this action, the Department seeks to ensure that TikTok honors its obligation to protect children's privacy rights and parents' efforts to protect their children."
The Justice Department, joined by the Federal Trade Commission, filed a civil lawsuit against TikTok Inc., ByteDance Ltd., and their affiliates for alleged violations of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act.
The privacy act prohibits website operators from knowingly collecting, using, or disclosing personal information from children younger than 13, unless they provide notice to and obtain consent from their parents. It further requires website operators to delete personal information collected from children at their parents’ request.
Friday's lawsuit follows another filed in 2019. At that time, the government sued TikTok's predecessor, Musical.ly, for COPPA violations. Since 2019, TikTok has been under a court order that requires the company to take specific measures to comply with the privacy law.
Prosecutors allege that from 2019 on, TikTok knowingly allowed children to create regular TikTok accounts and to use the short-form video and messaging service to interact with adults and others on the TikTok platform, according to the complaint.
Prosecutors said the company collected and kept a wide variety of personal information from child users 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 younger than 13 – the defendants unlawfully collected and kept child user's email addresses and other types of personal information, according to the complaint. Further, when parents discovered their children's accounts and asked TikTok to delete the accounts, the company failed to honor those requests. Prosecutors also accused the company of having ineffectual internal policies for locating and deleting TikTok accounts created by children.
The company denied the allegation in a statement.
"We disagree with these allegations, many of which relate to past events and practices that are factually inaccurate or have been addressed," according to the statement. "We are proud of our efforts to protect children, and we will continue to update and improve the platform. To that end, we offer age-appropriate experiences with stringent safeguards, proactively remove suspected underage users, and have voluntarily launched features such as default screentime limits, Family Pairing, and additional privacy protections for minors."
The company faces a number of challenges, including a law passed earlier this year that would force divesture of the company. In May, TikTok filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of a law that requires a sale or ban of the popular app. In April, Congress passed and President Joe Biden enacted a law that requires China's ByteDance to sell its ownership in TikTok or the app will be banned in the U.S. Some experts have said China could use the app's monitoring capabilities against Americans.
TikTok's Chinese ownership has been a source of concern for years. Critics have said TikTok is an extension of the Chinese Communist Party, as The Center Square previously reported .
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