TikTok and its Chinese parent company, ByteDancefiled a complaint against the United States on Tuesday, stating that the law that poses an ultimatum to the popular social network and threatens to ban it in the country next year is “unconstitutional” according to court documents.
At the end of April, the United States adopted a law that requires ByteDance to sell TikTok within 12 months, under penalty of banning that popular video-sharing application used by 170 million Americans.
The reasons considered are that the company collects data that can be used by the Chinese government for espionage and propaganda purposes.
The social network, numerous personalities and NGOs consider that the law violates the freedom of expression of its users, guaranteed by the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
“For the first time in history, Congress passed a law permanently banning a speech platform nationwide and prohibiting all Americans from participating in an online community with more than one billion people worldwide.” the company’s lawyers alleged in the lawsuit filed in federal court in Washington.
The legal battle It could even reach the Supreme Court.
The company has repeatedly denied any ties to the Chinese government and has assured that it has never and will never share private data of American users with Beijing.
TikTok has highlighted its investment of around US$1.5 billion in the “Texas Project”, so that the data of American users is stored within the country.
Days ago, the specialized website The Information published that ByteDance was studying the scenario of selling TikTok without handing over the powerful and secret algorithm that recommends its videos to the more than one billion global users. However, the Chinese technology giant denied this.
Critics say data collection and storage are only part of the problem and demand that the algorithm (the secret to its success) also be separated from ByteDance.
According to technology analysts, in the TikTok case national security reasons may weigh more before the Supreme Court than freedom of expression.
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Source: Gestion
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