TikTok Abuses Kids, say DoJ and FTC
U.S. Justice Dept. and Federal Trade Commission file lawsuit, alleging TikTok broke COPPA law.
TikTok and its Chinese parent ByteDance stand accused of knowingly violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA). The DoJ and FTC say TikTok let millions of pre-teen Americans “access adult content and interact with adult users,” despite promising they’d stop doing that.
This comes 16 months after the UK fined TikTok for similar failings. In today’s SB Blogwatch, we wonder what took the U.S. so long.
Your humble blogwatcher curated these bloggy bits for your entertainment. Not to mention: Wakeup supercut.
For You Plague
What’s the craic? Haleluya Hadero reports: Justice Department sues TikTok, accusing the company of illegally collecting children’s data
“Previous settlement”
The latest lawsuit focuses on allegations that TikTok … and its China-based parent company ByteDance violated a federal law that requires kid-oriented apps and websites to get parental consent before collecting personal information of children. … It also says the companies failed to honor requests from parents who wanted their children’s accounts deleted, and chose not to delete accounts even when the firms knew they belonged to kids.
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The complaint, filed together with the Federal Trade Commission, … comes as the U.S. and the prominent social media company are embroiled in yet another legal battle that will determine if – or how – TikTok will continue to operate in the country. … The U.S. decided to file the lawsuit following an investigation by the FTC that looked into whether the companies were complying with a previous settlement … in 2019.
Will this result in another slap on the wrist? Karandeep Singh Oberoi thinks not: TikTok in hot water again for letting kids sign up with their Google accounts
“Collecting and retaining”
The DOJ is not joking around. … The lawsuit is intended “to put an end to TikTok’s unlawful massive-scale invasions of children’s privacy.”
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According to the filing, the platform’s alleged extensive data collection practices, which affect “millions of American children younger than 13,” is what triggered the lawsuit. … TikTok enforces a minimum age requirement of 13, but the DOJ argues that it can easily be bypassed.
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[For example], the platform allowed users to create TikTok accounts using credentials from other services like Instagram and Google. … “As a result, for years millions of American children under 13 have been using TikTok and Defendants have been collecting and retaining children’s personal information,” reads the lawsuit.
Sure, data collection is icky, but is there a more serious problem? Sergiu Gatlan: US sues TikTok
“We are proud of our efforts”
The Justice Department argues that this practice [let] millions of young users … access adult content and interact with adult users. [It] asserts that TikTok and ByteDance were aware of these violations yet continued.
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In response to the lawsuit, TikTok stated, … ”We are proud of our efforts to protect children.” [And] that it disagrees with the “allegations, many of which relate to past events and practices that are factually inaccurate or have been addressed.”
“Relate to past events”? “Have been addressed”? lglethal doesn’t understand how we got here:
I’ve never understood how companies saying, “Oh we’ve addressed that. We no longer break the law, so we’re fine,” is considered a good defence. It’s admitting you were breaking the law!
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“Yes I killed him, but that was in the past. I’ve addressed my issues and I will not be killing anyone in the future. So I expect you to acquit me now.”
But is it really a problem? Yes it is, according to Robin-3:
This … is a problem. I hope they get taken to the cleaners for it, although I know better than to hold my breath.
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The hell of it is, these companies collecting and synthesizing all this user data probably actually can tell who’s a kid to a scary degree of accuracy. … If you’re collecting user data for targeted content/advertising, and your algorithms indicate that a user is likely a kid, [you should be] required to stop tracking that account’s data and otherwise treat it with the same privacy rights that would be granted a kid’s account.
One rule for us and another for you? grimblee seems to think so:
Facebook, Google, Microsoft—they all do it. But they’re not Chinese.
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I’m not advocating for TikTok or ByteDance, I’m just pointing out the hypocrisy and wish they would do the same with the predators on their side of the economic war.
Could there be a reason? ffkom alleges an allegation:
But those companies are sharing the data they harvest for free with the US three-letter organizations. So, no risk for them to ever get sued by the US.
But they’ve been dinged for privacy violations as well. As have others, reminds notinmykernel:
Don’t forget Amazon, [which] lost a lawsuit in 2022/2023. … Executives and high-level managers replied, “It’s the cost of doing business.”
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Unless there are meaningful penalties, user privacy will continue to be violated. We need reform ASAP.
And so, RubyPanther cuts to the chase:
They’re already under a permanent injunction requiring them to preserve data about their compliance, due to past … violations of the Act. If they’re still not preserving that data, that is a big problem.
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COPPA … does require online services to show good faith. … It’s hard to argue you complied when you destroyed the records of your compliance.
Meanwhile, Rich 2 feels prime:
And how in the name of the deity of your choice has it taken them 5 years to notice … the blindingly obvious? I sometimes feel I live in a parallel universe.
And Finally:
That’s quite a Liszt [You’re fired—Ed.]
CW: A couple of minor swears.
Previously in And Finally
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