TikTok and its former Chinese parent company, ByteDance, agreed on Friday to a $400 million settlement resolving U.S. Department of Justice allegations that the short-form video app violated children’s online privacy.
The Justice Department sued TikTok and ByteDance in 2024, accusing them of failing to protect children’s privacy and illegally collecting their data. The defendants allegedly violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), which requires online services directed at children to obtain parental consent before gathering personal information from users under 13.
Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward stated that the department’s priority “is ensuring that children are protected online and that companies entrusted with their personal information meet their legal obligations.”
TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Under the terms, TikTok will pay $300 million immediately and an additional $100 million upon the vacating of a 2019 consent decree with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) against its predecessor, Musical.ly. In that earlier agreement, the FTC found that Musical.ly knew young children used the platform but failed to obtain parental consent for collecting names, email addresses, and other personal data, resulting in a $5.7 million penalty.
Earlier this year, ByteDance agreed to create a majority American-owned joint venture to safeguard U.S. user data and avert a potential ban on the app, which boasts more than 200 million American users. The government noted that TikTok has since implemented significant changes to its ownership structure, management, compliance operations, and privacy practices.
The DOJ said the settlement “ensures that American families continue to benefit from stronger protections without the delay and uncertainty of protracted litigation.” In a court filing, TikTok’s U.S. joint venture stated that it now requires all users to provide their date of birth to access the platform.
TikTok said it has developed sophisticated age-moderation systems to identify children under 13 who misrepresent their age. According to the filing, the company employs hundreds of staff trained in underage moderation and deletes tens of thousands of underage accounts as a result.
