On Friday evening (July 26), the U.S. Department of Justice requested the appeals court to dismiss TikTok’s lawsuit against a law. This law requires ByteDance to divest its U.S. assets from TikTok by January 19 next year, otherwise TikTok will face a ban in the United States.
According to Reuters, the Department of Justice stated: “The serious national security threat posed by TikTok is real,” and “TikTok provides the Chinese (CCP) government with means to undermine U.S. national security through data collection and covert content manipulation.”
After a series of still classified briefings, U.S. lawmakers swiftly passed the TikTok ban bill. On April 24, President Biden signed the TikTok Act; on May 7, TikTok and its Chinese parent company ByteDance filed a lawsuit against this law in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, arguing that it violated the First Amendment protection of freedom of speech.
The Department of Justice’s documents detail the government’s broad national security concerns regarding TikTok. The Department of Justice stated that the CCP’s long-term geopolitical strategy includes developing and pre-deploying assets for use at the right time.
“The United States does not need to wait until foreign adversaries take specific harmful actions before responding to such threats,” the Department of Justice emphasized.
In addition, the Department of Justice submitted a confidential document to the court, detailing other security concerns brought about by ByteDance’s ownership of TikTok, as well as statements from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and the Department of Justice’s National Security Division.
The U.S. Congress and government are concerned that under the Chinese National Security Law, the Chinese government may access TikTok’s data from 170 million U.S. users. FBI Director Christopher Wray has warned that ByteDance is “controlled by the Chinese (CCP) government.” He cautioned that the Beijing authorities can influence Americans by manipulating the algorithm controlling what people see on TikTok, as well as allowing the Chinese government to collect user data for “traditional espionage activities.”
The Department of Justice believes that under CCP ownership, TikTok poses a serious national security threat to Americans, as the app can access a large amount of personal information of Americans. The U.S. government also believes that the CCP can secretly manipulate information consumed by Americans through TikTok.
TikTok has repeatedly denied sharing U.S. user data with China, and has not yet responded to the latest developments.
Following President Biden’s signing of the law including the TikTok ban, the White House expressed its desire to end CCP’s ownership of TikTok on national security grounds, but did not wish to ban TikTok in the U.S.
The Department of Justice also rejected all arguments put forward by TikTok, including the claim that the law infringes on Americans’ First Amendment right to freedom of speech. The Department of Justice stated that the purpose of this law is to address national security issues, not freedom of speech, with the aim of preventing the CCP from using TikTok to obtain sensitive personal information of Americans.
On June 18, Bloomberg reported that U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal objected to ByteDance’s argument, claiming that the burden of proof lies with TikTok.
“They asked for a presumption that a congressional statute is invalid, while the congressional statute is presumed valid,” said former U.S. attorney Blumenthal in an interview.
“They are just a platform. They express nothing, what they express is their users,” said the Democrat from Connecticut, Blumenthal. “What right do they have to demand users’ rights?”
The Department of Justice also pointed out that TikTok’s efforts to protect U.S. user data are inadequate.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia will hold oral arguments on this legal challenge on September 16, with TikTok and the Department of Justice requesting a ruling by December 6.
If ByteDance fails to divest TikTok before January 19 next year, this law will prohibit app stores like Apple and Google from providing TikTok app download services and internet hosting services supporting TikTok.