TikTok is collecting, sharing user views on issues like abortion, DOJ fires back in ban lawsuit

TikTok and parent company ByteDance have been accused of transmitting personal user data on issues like abortion and gun control between U.S. and Chinese employees on an internal web suite.

The U.S. Justice Department is standing its ground in the case for a TikTok ban, citing a national cybersecurity risk based on the way the app collect's personal data.

In new documents filed on July 26, the Department of Justice accuses the platform of collecting and then transmitting sensitive, personal user data from U.S. employees to ByteDance engineers in China, using an internal communication web suite system called Lark. The data includes user views on social issues like gun control, abortion, and religion, collected through accounts' posts and interactions. It was then stored on Chinese servers, the department alleges.

The filing warned that the app could engage in "covert content manipulation" of its users. "By directing ByteDance or TikTok to covertly manipulate that algorithm, China could, for example, further its existing malign influence operations and amplify its efforts to undermine trust in our democracy and exacerbate social divisions," the department's legal brief, which hasn't been made available publicly, reads.

TikTok has maintained that it operates independently from the Chinese government, and does not share any American user data with the foreign power.

"Nothing in this brief changes the fact that the Constitution is on our side," TikTok wrote in a statement posted on X. "As we’ve said before, the government has never put forth proof of its claims, including when Congress passed this unconstitutional law. Today, once again, the government is taking this unprecedented step while hiding behind secret information. We remain confident we will prevail in court."

The back and forth is the result of years of attempted federal regulation of the China-affiliated app. Earlier this year, President Joe Biden signed off on a foreign aid package which included a bill requiring ByteDance to sell its shares in the app to another buyer that meets U.S. government requirements.

In May, TikTok's parent company ByteDance filed a lawsuit against the federal government's actions, holding tight to its claim that the move to "subject a single, named speech platform to a permanent, nationwide ban" is unconstitutional and a violation of the rights of American citizens. The following month, the company filed its opening brief in the expected long legal battle.

ByteDance has a 270-day deadline to comply, as of April 24.