As part of its argument in support of legislation recently signed by President Biden that could force the shutdown of TikTok, the Justice Department has argued that the social media app transmits information about Americans’ social views to Chinese engineers.
In a brief filed Friday night, examination According to the Associated Press, the Justice Department accused TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, of using an internal website system called Lark to allow TikTok employees to communicate sensitive data about U.S. users to ByteDance engineers in China.
of Filing The lawsuit alleges that Lark’s internal search tools allowed TikTok and ByteDance employees in the United States and China to gather information about users’ content and opinions on abortion and religion.
The Justice Department argues that this isn’t a theoretical concern, but rather an opportunity for TikTok to covertly manipulate its algorithms, an app that presents users with a series of videos based on complex algorithms that are supposed to be tailored to their interests.
“By directing ByteDance and TikTok to covertly manipulate algorithms, China could, for example, further its existing malign influence efforts, undermining trust in democracy and exacerbating social divisions,” the report said. state.
The Justice Department official added that TikTok and ByteDance employees have already engaged in a practice known as “heating,” whereby they can decide to promote certain videos to get a certain number of views, which U.S. authorities say the companies can use to curate videos that they deem divisive.
The Department of Justice also alleges that TikTok has deployed tools to suppress content based on the use of certain trigger words.
ByteDance operates a TikTok-like app called Douyin, and the company has been aggressively using its throttling tools to comply with China’s strict censorship laws, but the Justice Department has said TikTok does the same outside of China. TikTok has been under investigation for these policies since 2022.
The lawsuit is part of a larger litigation between the U.S. government and TikTok over a bill signed into law by President Biden in April that would ban the Chinese-made social app used by hundreds of millions of Americans within months if ByteDance does not sell TikTok in the United States to a U.S.-based operator.
TikTok has vigorously opposed the bill, calling it unconstitutional. Friday’s briefs defended the law in a federal court in Washington, D.C., but TikTok argued that the briefs don’t change the facts of the case.
“This summary doesn’t change the fact that the Constitution is on our side,” TikTok Posted in X. “As we have said before, the government has never provided any evidence for its claims, including when Parliament passed this unconstitutional bill. Today, the government is once again hiding behind secret intelligence to take this unprecedented step.”
“We are confident we will prevail in court,” the social media company added.
The government argues that the existence of the Lark data transfer is further evidence against TikTok’s contention that its $1.5 billion mitigation plan, “Project Texas,” to store U.S. user data on servers owned and controlled by Oracle, is not enough to prevent national security concerns.
Federal authorities are also asking the court to allow them to release confidential legal summaries to which the companies do not have access. According to the Associated Press.
Oral arguments in the case are scheduled for September.
