- A group of 21 Republican AGs filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in TikTok Inc. v. Merrick Garland, No.24-1113, in support of the U.S. DOJ and urging the court to deny the petition for review of TikTok Inc. and its parent company, ByteDance, Ltd., in their First Amendment challenge to the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, which bans the TikTok app in the United States unless ByteDance divests TikTok.
- In related news, the U.S. DOJ, on behalf of the FTC, filed a lawsuit against TikTok, ByteDance, and affiliated companies alleging that they violated the FTC Act, and the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (“COPPA”) and related regulations, by allowing children under 13 to create and use TikTok accounts without parental consent, collecting extensive data from children, and failing to comply with parents’ requests to delete their children’s accounts and personal information, among other allegations.
- We have previously reported on other actions against TikTok, including Montana AG Austin Knudsen’s defense of a state TikTok ban, and lawsuits filed by Utah AG Sean Reyes, Nebraska AG Mike Hilgers, Iowa AG Brenna Bird, and Indiana AG Todd Rokita.