ISTANBUL
Two US agencies filed Friday a lawsuit against popular social short-video hosting service TikTok and its parent company ByteDance for alleged widespread violations of children’s privacy laws.
The Justice Department, together with the Federal Trade Commission, filed the civil lawsuit in the US District Court for the Central District of California against TikTok Inc., ByteDance Ltd., and their affiliates for violations of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and its implementing regulations in connection with TikTok application.
“COPPA prohibits website operators from knowingly collecting, using, or disclosing personal information from children under the age of 13, unless they provide notice to and obtain consent from those children’s parents,” the Justice Department said in a statement.
“It also requires website operators to delete personal information collected from children at their parents’ request,” it added.
The Justice Department recalled that the US government sued TikTok’s predecessor, Musical.ly, in 2019 for COPPA violations, and since then the defendants have been subject to a court order requiring them to undertake specific measures to comply with COPPA.
“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,” said the statement.
“The defendants collected and retained a wide variety of personal information from these children without notifying or obtaining consent from their parents,” it added.
The Justice Department argued that even for accounts that were created in “Kids Mode,” which is version of TikTok intended for children under 13, the defendants unlawfully collected and retained children’s email addresses and other types of personal information.
In addition, when parents discovered their children’s accounts and asked the defendants to delete the accounts and information in them, the defendants frequently failed to comply with those requests, the agency argued.
“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 the 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.”
