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In this photo illustration, the TikTok app is displayed on an iPhone screen in Miami, Florida on April 24, 2024.
CNN
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Allowing TikTok to remain operated by its current parent company could enable the Chinese government to covertly influence U.S. elections, the Justice Department said in a court filing late Friday.
In filings with the federal appeals court, prosecutors expressed concern that TikTok’s algorithms could be used in a “covert manipulation” campaign to “influence the views of Americans for its own purposes.”
“Among other things, this bill would enable foreign governments to unlawfully interfere in our political system and political discourse, including our elections,” the prosecutors wrote. “For example, if the Chinese government determines that the outcome of a particular U.S. election is sufficiently important to China’s interests,” the document added.
“Allowing the Chinese government to remain poised to exploit TikTok at this critical moment poses an unacceptable threat to national security,” the prosecutors wrote.
The complaint is in response to a federal lawsuit that TikTok filed against the US government in May. The suit sought to block legislation that could have forced a nationwide ban of the app. The legislation, signed by President Joe Biden in April, states that TikTok faces a total ban in the US if it does not find a new owner by mid-January 2025.
Friday’s lawsuit marks the first time the federal government has responded to a lawsuit. The legal battle could determine whether U.S. national security concerns about TikTok’s ties to China trump the First Amendment rights of TikTok’s 170 million U.S. users.
In their lawsuit, TikTok and Bytedance argue that the U.S. law is unconstitutional because it violates the right to free speech and prevents Americans from accessing lawful information.
“For the first time in history, Congress has enacted legislation to permanently ban a single, named speech platform nationwide, barring all Americans from participating in a unique online community that reaches more than one billion people worldwide,” TikTok’s lawyers wrote in the lawsuit.
The lawsuit follows long-running U.S. allegations that TikTok’s ties to China could expose Americans’ personal information to the Chinese government.
The Justice Department now says TikTok is misapplying the First Amendment. “The Act targets national security concerns specific to TikTok’s ties to hostile foreign powers, not the suppression of protected speech,” the Justice Department filing said, adding that if ByteDance sells TikTok to a U.S. affiliate, the app could operate uninterrupted in the United States.
Senior Justice Department officials spoke about the allegations, saying the department is concerned about any efforts by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to “weaponize technology,” such as apps and software that run on cell phones used in the United States.
One official said those concerns were “exacerbated by authoritarian states, like China, that demand and coerce companies under their control to secretly hand over sensitive data to the Chinese government.”
Some Defense Department officials, unrelated to the lawsuit, have already spoken out about the security risks of the video app.
Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco warned against the use of the app last year, saying “companies doing business in China should be extremely concerned because they are subject to China’s national security laws and are required to submit data to the state.”
“I don’t use TikTok and I don’t encourage anyone to use it,” Monaco said.
“The TikTok app collects massive amounts of sensitive data from its 170 million U.S. users,” the Justice Department’s filing states, “including users’ precise geolocation, viewing habits, and private messages, as well as data about users’ phone contacts when they do not use TikTok.”
Prosecutors wrote that some of the users TikTok is harvesting data from are teenagers “who may be family members or future government employees.”
Friday’s filing makes clear that law enforcement officials believe TikTok can, and in some instances has, received instructions from the Chinese government.
The prosecutors wrote that the proprietary algorithms used by TikTok “can be manually manipulated and, because they are located in China, allow the Chinese government to covertly control the algorithms and secretly shape the content U.S. users receive for its own nefarious purposes.”
For example, law enforcement officials are aware of tools used in China that allow TikTok to suppress certain content on the app. While the tools are not believed to have been used in the U.S., the existence of the technology raises significant concerns about whether the app could potentially collect, censor or even promote certain content for U.S. users, Justice Department officials said.
Senior executives also expressed concerns about employees’ ability to collect large amounts of information based on users’ content discussing issues such as gun control, abortion and religion.
