Justice Dept. claims TikTok collected US user views on issues like abortion and gun control

WASHINGTON — In a fresh attack on one of the world’s most popular tech companies, the Justice Department accused TikTok of abusing its ability to collect vast amounts of information about users based on views on divisive social issues such as gun control, abortion and religion.

Government lawyers wrote in a brief filed in federal appeals court in Washington that TikTok and its Beijing-based parent company ByteDance used an internal web suite system called Lark that allowed TikTok employees to communicate directly with ByteDance engineers in China.

TikTok employees used Lark to send sensitive data about U.S. users. That information was ultimately stored on Chinese servers and accessed by ByteDance employees in China, federal officials said.

One of Lark’s internal search tools, the filing statements, allows ByteDance and TikTok employees in the U.S. and China to collect information about users’ content or speech, including opinions on sensitive topics like abortion or religion. Last year, the Wall Street Journal reported that TikTok had tracked users viewing LGBTQ content through a dashboard that the company said it had since removed.

The new court filings mark the government’s first major defense in a major legal battle over the future of the popular social media platform, used by more than 170 million Americans. Under a law signed by President Joe Biden in April, the company could face a ban within months if it doesn’t cut ties with ByteDance.

The measure passed with bipartisan support after lawmakers and administration officials raised concerns that Chinese authorities could force ByteDance to hand over data on U.S. users or sway public opinion toward Beijing’s interests by manipulating the algorithm that populates users’ feeds.

The Justice Department issued a stark warning about the possibility of what it described as “covert manipulation of content” by the Chinese government, saying the algorithm could be designed to shape the content users receive.

“By directing ByteDance or TikTok to covertly manipulate that algorithm, China could, for example, continue its existing malign influence operations and ramp up its efforts to undermine trust in our democracy and increase societal divisions,” the report said.

The concern, they said, is more than theoretical, alleging that employees at TikTok and ByteDance have been known to engage in a practice called “heating,” in which certain videos are promoted to garner a certain number of views. While this capability allows TikTok to curate and more broadly distribute popular content, U.S. officials say it could also be used for darker purposes.

Justice Department officials are asking the court to release a confidential version of the legal file, which is not accessible to the two companies.

Nothing in the redacted summary “changes the fact that the Constitution is on our side,” TikTok spokesman Alex Haurek said in a statement.

“The TikTok ban would silence the voices of 170 million Americans in violation of the First Amendment,” Haurek said. “As we’ve said before, the government has never presented any evidence to support its claims, including when Congress passed this unconstitutional law. Today, the government is once again taking this unprecedented step while hiding behind classified information. We are confident we will prevail in court.”

In redacted court documents, the Justice Department said another tool triggered content suppression based on the use of certain words. Some of the tool’s policies applied to ByteDance users in China, where the company operates a similar app called Douyin that follows Beijing’s strict censorship rules.

But Justice Department officials said other policies may have applied to TikTok users outside of China. TikTok was investigating the existence of those policies and whether they had ever been used in the U.S. in or around 2022, officials said.

The government points to the Lark data transfers to explain why federal officials do not believe Project Texas, TikTok’s $1.5 billion mitigation plan to store U.S. users’ data on servers owned and maintained by tech giant Oracle, is sufficient to protect national security.

In its legal challenge to the law, TikTok has relied heavily on arguments that the potential ban violates the First Amendment because it prevents the app from continuing to allow speech unless it brings in a new owner through a complex divestiture process. It has also argued that divestiture would change speech on the platform because a new social platform would lack the algorithm that has driven its success.

In its response, the Justice Department said TikTok has not made valid free speech claims. It said the law is focused on national security concerns and does not address protected speech. It also said that China and ByteDance, as foreign entities, are not protected by the First Amendment.

TikTok has also argued that US law discriminates based on viewpoint, citing comments by some lawmakers who criticized what they saw as anti-Israel sentiment on the platform during the war in Gaza.

Justice Department officials dispute that argument, saying the law at issue reflects their longstanding concern that China could use technology as a weapon against U.S. national security, fears they say are exacerbated by demands that companies controlled by Beijing hand over sensitive data to the government. They say TikTok, under its current operating structure, is obligated to respond to those demands.

Oral arguments in the case are scheduled for September.