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Despite bipartisan support for banning TikTok – essentially spyware presenting a national security threat from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) – in the United States (as done by India) and the Supreme Court’s upholding of the law as constitutional and requiring the app to go dark, President Trump signed an Executive Order (EO) during his first day in office giving TikTok 75 days to “pursue a resolution.”

TikTok already had several months to “pursue a resolution,” which was to divest itself from the PRC so it could not collect and use Americans’ sensitive data. TikTok does not want to pursue this resolution because it wants to keep collecting, using, manipulating, and spying on U.S. citizens.

This is a disappointing development, and hopefully, Trump, who originally supported the ban, will come to his senses to protect national security and keep the PRC from spying on unwary citizens.

TikTok users are seeking alternate platforms to share and view content as the U.S. is set to ban the popular social media app on January 19, 2025. Instead of turning to U.S.-based companies like Facebook or Instagram, users are flocking to another Chinese app called Xiaohongshu, also known as RedNote. The app, which previously had little presence in the U.S. market, shot up to the most downloaded app in Apple’s app store this week. RedNote shares similarities to Yelp, where users share recommendations, but it also allows users to post short clips, similar to the soon-to-be-banned TikTok.

While some of these TikTok users choose to switch to RedNote because of the similar short-form video format, other users appear to be purposefully choosing another Chinese-owned app as a form of protest. Either way, ordinary American and Chinese citizens can easily interact in new ways on the internet through RedNote.

However, RedNote includes many of the same privacy and national security issues that the U.S. government raised concerning TikTok. Although many users ordinarily ignore privacy policies, RedNote’s privacy policy is written in Mandarin, making it even more difficult (and in some cases impossible) for users to understand. A translation of the privacy policy indicates that RedNote collects sensitive data like a user’s IP address and browsing habits. As a Chinese-based app, RedNote is also similarly subject to the Chinese data laws that led U.S. lawmakers to ban TikTok. The TikTok ban could eventually be extended to include RedNote and other Chinese (and other foreign country) apps national security and privacy concerns exist. With other short-form video services (e.g., Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts) provided by U.S. companies, users do not need to expose their personal data to Chinese-based companies. Additionally, using RedNote to circumvent the TikTok ban could be problematic, particularly for government workers with security clearances. RedNote is not worth these risks, and Americans should avoid downloading it.

The United States Supreme Court announced on December 18, 2024, that it will hear the TikTok ban case and has scheduled oral arguments for January 10, 2025, before the ban’s January 19, 2025 effective date.

The case stems from a bipartisan law signed by President Biden that required ByteDance, the Chinese-based parent of the app TikTok, to divest from the app or face a ban in the U.S. because it poses a threat to national security. In addition to being a threat to national security, numerous states have filed suit against TikTok alleging that the app has caused a mental health crisis for youth in the U.S. Forbes has reported on “numerous concerns involving the company, including Tiktok spying on journalists, promoting Chinese propaganda criticizing U.S. politicians, mishandling user data, and tracking ‘sensitive words.’”

ByteDance sought emergency relief from the U.S. Supreme Court following a lower federal court’s decision that the ban does not violate TikTok’s First Amendment rights. The district court judge held that if Chinese-owned ByteDance divests from TikTok, the app will be available to users in the U.S.  ByteDance sought emergency relief from the federal circuit court but was denied on December 13, 2024.

The Supreme Court will consider whether the law banning TikTok from the U.S. violates the First Amendment. It is mind-boggling that the Chinese government (which backs ByteDance and is one of the U.S.’s primary cyber adversaries actively engaged in cyber warfare against us) can actually allege it has First Amendment rights in the U.S. Since when can a cyber enemy use our court system to advocate for using spyware against our children? We will be watching the case carefully.

Last week, we outlined the lawsuits against TikTok by New York, California, and North Carolina, that followed in the footsteps of Nebraska, Nevada (which filed suit against TikTok in February of 2024), and Indiana, which filed suit against TikTok in 2022. Since last week, at least 11 more states have joined the fray, including Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Jersey, Oregon, South Carolina, Vermont, Washington, and the District of Columbia.

The coalition of Attorneys General have each filed a suit against TikTok in their own state jurisdictions, alleging that TikTok mislead the public about the safety of the platform, that the platform knowingly uses addictive features, and that it harms young people’s mental health.

Separately, the Texas Attorney General has filed suit against TikTok alleging that it is violating Texas’ “The Security Children Online Through Parental Empowerment Act,” which went into effect on September 1, 2024. The law “bans social media companies from selling or even sharing a minor’s information unless it has the approval of a guardian of the minor.” We anticipate that more states will join the cause piling on top of TikTok’s current legal woes.

On October 11, 2024, following the filing of a lawsuit against TikTok by the Kentucky Attorney General, Senators Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), who authored the bipartisan “Kids Online Safety Act,” requested that TikTok CEO Shou Chew provide all “documents, communications, and research held by TikTok regarding the safety of minors on its platform.” The request is “in response to shocking revelations of TikTok’s awareness of, and indifference to, its platform’s substantial harm to children and teens.” The letter specifically requests that TikTok provide the Senators with the “documents and information  previously produced to the Kentucky Attorney General’s Office and other states Attorneys General.” TikTok is required to produce the documents by October 25, 2024. 

Following in the footsteps of Nebraska, the Attorneys General of North Carolina, California, and New Jersey filed complaints against TikTok and its owner, ByteDance, Ltd., on October 8, 2024.

The suits are lengthy and full of allegations against TikTok and how it is responsible for a “profound mental health crisis” of American teenagers. The suits allege that TikTok designed its social media platform to target youth and “manipulates them into habitual use, and mines the data produced by their excessive and compulsive use for more and more profit.”

The New Jersey complaint alleges that, for American youth, there are no limits on its use and that it is designed to promote excessive use. On the other hand, the Chinese equivalent of TikTok, known as Douyin, “limits which hours in the day young users can access it and for how long. Chinese youth are required to wait through a five-second pause between videos when they spend too much time on Douyin. Some are limited to 40 minutes of use per day.” This revelation is telling—the Chinese version of TikTok requires limitations on use by young users but does not restrict and, in fact, encourages unhealthy levels of use for American youth.

The complaints each outline in detail how TikTok lured Americans between 13 and 17 to become users and how TikTok designed its platform “to promote excessive, compulsive, and addictive use” and achieved young users’ usage to “almost constantly.” The complaints all outline how the use of TikTok by young users has been harmful to them. California alleges that “TikTok designs and provides beauty filters that it knows harm its young users” and that “encourage unhealthy, negative social comparison-which, in turn, can cause body image issues and related mental and physical disorders.” In addition, it alleges that “the platform’s addictive qualities, and the resulting excessive use by minors, harms those minors’ mental and physical health. Among the harms suffered by TikTok’s younger users are abnormal neurological changes, insufficient sleep, inadequate socialization with others, and increased risk of mood disorders such as depression and anxiety.”  If that isn’t enough to get off TikTok, I don’t know what is. The federal government and some state governments prohibit employees from using TikTok. Montana attempted to prohibit its use and was sued by TikTok. In a rare bipartisan move, Congress passed—and President Biden signed—legislation prohibiting TikTok from use in the U.S. That law is being challenged in litigation by TikTok, a Chinese-based platform, on First Amendment grounds. Now, four state Attorneys General are sounding the alarm about the harmful effects on youth in our country when using TikTok. How much is enough for people to understand the national security threat that TikTok poses and the threat it poses to our children?

We have previously outlined the risks of using TikTok, the federal and state governments’ ban on it, and the national security risks it presents.

In doing so, we primarily focused on data privacy and security threats to TikTok users. Recently, Nebraska and the U.S. Department of Justice each sued TikTok directly for different allegations relevant to the use of TikTok by children. The allegations made in the complaints are heartbreaking and detailed below.

State of Nebraska Complaint

The complaint against TikTok in Nebraska, led by the state Attorney General’s consumer protection division, details how TikTok is marketed to young children and self-acclaimed as “addicting.” Internal documents obtained show that the owners of TikTok purposefully market its use to children under the age of 13 as they lack the executive  decision-making ability to limit its use. This excessive use of TikTok is precisely what the app’s owners are striving to achieve. Young TikTok users admit they are addicted, and statistics show that they use TikTok into the wee hours of the morning. Even more disturbing is the content that TikTok appears to be purposefully pushing to young children—harmful content, including “mature and inappropriate content, content related to eating disorders, sadness and suicide, and pornography.” On top of that, the complaint alleges that it is “incredibly difficult” to delete an account.

The complaint alleges that TikTok is harmful and dangerous to children and youth, including “increased rates of depression, anxiety, loneliness, low self-esteem, and suicide, interfering with sleep and education, fueling body dysmorphia and eating disorders, and contributing to youth addiction.” The complaint alleges that TikTok: is misrepresenting that it is safe for use; is engaging in deceptive and unfair acts and practices in violation of the Nebraska Consumer Protection Act and Deceptive Trade Practice Act; and has false or misleading statements in its privacy policy. The complaint seeks injunctive relief, civil fines and penalties, and disgorgement of all profits made in Nebraska.

We will be watching this litigation closely, including other states that may follow suit.

Department of Justice Complaint

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has also recently filed suit against TikTok. The DOJ’s suit concentrates on TikTok’s alleged violations of the federal statute known as the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). The allegations in the complaint detail how TikTok allows children under the age of 13 to register for a TikTok account that is not in “Kids Mode” and can easily evade the platform’s processes to determine the user’s age. Further, a user under the age of 13 can open an account without parental consent or through Instagram or Google, which the DOJ alleges is a violation of COPPA.

Similar to allegations outlined in Nebraska’s complaint, the DOJ complaint outlines how TikTok makes it very difficult to delete accounts and has “obstructed and failed to honor” parents’ request for deletion and return of their children’s account, personal information, and data collected by the app. The complaint alleges that TikTok failed to delete and continued to collect data from children despite deletion requests from parents. According to the complaint, TikTok retains users’ data “long after purportedly deleting their accounts.”

The complaint alleges that TikTok has insufficient internal policies to flag underage users and that TikTok does not follow its own policies to monitor the platform for underage users, thereby allowing “millions of children” under the age of 13 to be able to use the platform without parental consent in violation of COPPA.

The DOJ complaint further alleges that TikTok has violated the 2019 consent order entered into by TikTok and the Federal Trade Commission by not maintaining records evidencing compliance with its terms. It further alleges that TikTok misrepresented its remedial conduct by failing to ensure that all U.S.-based accounts were routed through an age gate and that it had deleted children’s data in May of 2020. TikTok later admitted that the representation was false.

The DOJ seeks injunctive relief, fines, and penalties for TikTok’s violation of COPPA. If you are a parent whose child is using TikTok, take a look at the complaints. They will give you details of how harmful using TikTok is for your child, and TikTok’s lack of adherence to its own processes to minimize its use by young children.

Nebraska recently filed suit against TikTok, and the details of the harms associated with using TikTok by children are outlined in the complaint. Although the complaint seeks redress only for Nebraskans, the allegations are relevant to parents in all states.

We expect our state and federal governments to make laws that protect children from the sale and marketing of harmful products, such as alcohol, tobacco, drugs, and pornography. According to allegations by the Nebraska Attorney General, using TikTok is just as harmful to the health and well-being of children as alcohol, tobacco, and drugs. The use of TikTok by children is addicting. TikTok knows it, and it is marketing specifically to children because they are unable to understand dangers of its use. TikTok is not restricting the content that children can view, including  “mature and inappropriate content, content related to eating disorders, sadness and suicide, and pornography.” Parents: you can’t rely on TikTok to protect your child, particularly after reading Nebraska’s complaint. Take a hard look at the complaint so you can understand how TikTok is harming your child.—

TikTok has reported that it is responding to a cyber attack targeting a limited number of known brands and celebrity accounts. The BBC has identified that Paris Hilton’s account as being targeted, but TikTok says it was not compromised.

The BBC identified CNN as a victim whose account was successfully attacked. TikTok is working with CNN and other affected users to restore access to their accounts.

To add to TikTok’s legal woes in the U.S., Nebraska Attorney General Mike Hilgers (AG) filed suit against TikTok on May 22, 2024, alleging that TikTok violated Nebraska’s consumer protection laws and engaged in deceptive trade practices by “designing and operating a platform that is addictive and harmful to teens and children.” In addition, the AG alleges that “TikTok’s features fail to protect kids and regularly expose underage users to age-inappropriate and otherwise harmful content.”

The AG alleges that the use of TikTok by children in Nebraska “has fueled a youth mental health crisis in Nebraska.” The AG further alleges that TikTok is “addictive, that compulsive use is rampant, and that its purported safety features, such as age verification and parental controls, are grossly ineffective.”

The AG filed suit after his office conducted an investigation into TikTok’s practices, which included creating TikTok accounts of fictitious minors. According to the AG, TikTok’s algorithm directed the fictitious minors to inappropriate content “within minutes” of opening an account.

TikTok denies the allegations. We will continue to follow and update our readers on developments in the TikTok debate.