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A woman from British Columbia alleges that she and other TikTok users were subject to the “clandestine” collection of their data by the app developers in a new class action lawsuit.
Lead plaintiff, Lisa Thomas, says that ByteDance Ltd and its subsidiaries collected TikTok users’ data starting in 2017, and perhaps earlier, without their knowledge or consent. The class action lawsuit claims that, in addition, the app developers included an extra layer of encryption to conceal the alleged data collection. The defendants then allegedly used the information they collected to create “granular and invasive profiles of users.”
ByteDance Ltd is a company incorporated in the Cayman Islands with a principal place of business in China, states the complaint. ByteDance manages the TikTok app in Canada. Its affiliate, TikTok Ltd, is also incorporated in the Cayman Islands and its function is to advertise the app to Canadians. Several other companies, TikTok LLC and TikTok Inc, are American companies that sell advertising to Canadian businesses, along with TikTok Pte Ltd, which is based in Singapore.
The plaintiff claims that ByteDance and its affiliates, all named as defendants in the TikTok class action lawsuit, worked together to collect user data without consent, conceal the collection of that data, and sell it to third parties. Lisa says that she downloaded the app to her mobile device. At no point did she consent to the collection of her personal information, claims Lisa, nor was she aware that the TikTok app would collect such information.
TikTok User Data Collection
According to the complaint, those who used the app through Google’s Android mobile operating systems unwittingly provided unique device identifiers, called MAC addresses.
“A media access control address (‘MAC address’), also known as a ‘physical address’ or a ‘burned-in address’ is a unique identifier assigned by the manufacturer to the wired or wireless network chip used to access a data network over Ethernet, WiFi, or Bluetooth. A MAC address is unique to a device, and can be used to track that device,” explains the TIkTok app class action lawsuit. “Typically, the user of a device cannot change the MAC address assigned to their device.”
Allegedly, MAC addresses can be used to track users, even if they use their device settings to opt out of use of their information by apps and even if they uninstall and reinstall the app.
“MAC addresses need to be kept separate from a person’s real name, registered name, physical location and biographical details: Otherwise, the combination of some or all of that information with a MAC address permits the data holder to track and monitor users across a wide spectrum of services, even when users have legitimately attempted to protect their privacy,” contends the complaint.
Notably, points out the plaintiff, Google’s policies prohibit the collection of MAC addresses.
“Users of the TikTok app are not given an option to consent to the collection of their device’s MAC address, and it would be unknown to them that this data collection was occurring,” further argues the class action lawsuit. “ByteDance’s deliberate and clandestine practices intentionally invade Class Members’ privacy…”
TikTok User Data Collected and Sold
The TikTok app class action lawsuit alleges that despite a prohibition on the collection of MAC addresses by apps on both Google and Apple devices starting in 2015, TikTok has collected such information from all users, including minors, since at least 2017.
“From a date currently unknown to the Plaintiff, but well known to the Defendants, ByteDance exploited a bug in AndroidOS to circumvent the restriction against collecting MAC addresses from users of the TikTok app on AndroidOS devices, including the Plaintiff and Class Members,” alleges the complaint.
The plaintiff says that the motive behind ByteDance’s collection of user information is simple – money from the sale of this information to advertising companies. The plaintiff says that through her class action lawsuit, Canadians will be able to hold the makers of TikTok responsible.
TikTok Faces U.S. Ban, Litigation
The U.S. government took issue with the alleged collection of user data and threatened to ban TikTok this summer. Of particular concern is the collection of data from underage TikTok users. The Trump administration also reportedly accused ByteDance, a Chinese company, of making Americans’ user data available to the Chinese government.
Child advocacy groups have echoed concern over the alleged improper collection of underage TikTok user data by the app developers and their affiliates.
Do you use the TikTok app? Are you concerned about the data allegedly collected by the app? Tell us what you think in the comment section below.
The plaintiff and proposed Class Members are represented by Anthony A Vecchio, Q.C. of Slater Vecchio LLP.
The TikTok App Class Action Lawsuit is Thomas v. Bytedance Ltd, et al., Case No. S-209073, in the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Vancouver.
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2 thoughts onTikTok App Allegedly Collects and Sells Users’ Data
How do I become a part of the lawsuit
I’m not sure entirely yet but the lawsuit was through Slater Vecchio LLP