TikTok and its China-based parent company ByteDance have a tool to collect information on users based on their views on hot button social issues such as gun control, abortion, and religion, according to the Department of Justice (DOJ).
In a brief filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on July 26, the Justice Department said TikTok employees were able to communicate directly with ByteDance engineers in China via an internal web-suite system called “Lark,” which also went by the name “Feishu.”
TikTok employees had “sent significant amounts of restricted U.S. user data” through Lark channels to “address various operations issues,” according to a court filing. It added this meant “certain sensitive U.S. person data” were being stored on Chinese servers and accessible to ByteDance employees in China.
One of the tools inside Lark would allow ByteDance and TikTok employees “to collect bulk user information based on the user’s content or expressions, including views on gun control, abortion, and religion,” a federal official said, according to the court filing.
Additionally, the DOJ’s court filing stated that TikTok had created “an internal project” in 2022 to remove certain sensitive U.S. user data alleged to be “improperly maintained” on Lark channels.
“The serious national-security threat posed by TikTok is real, as evidenced by the public record and confirmed by classified information supplied by the intelligence community,” the DOJ’s brief reads.
“The Chinese government’s authority over ByteDance enables it to gain access to and exploit that [user] information to undermine U.S. national security, including by developing and recruiting intelligence assets, identifying American covert intelligence officers and assets, and blackmailing or coercing Americans.”
Another tool inside Lark could be used to trigger the “suppression of content” on TikTok based on the use of certain words. “Although this tool contained certain policies that only applied to users based in China, [other] such policies may have been used to apply to TikTok users outside of China,” the DOJ’s filing reads.
‘Covert Content Manipulation’
Casey Blackburn, a senior U.S. intelligence official, stated in a separate court document that it has been shown that TikTok has taken censorship orders from the Chinese authorities.“Intelligence reporting further demonstrates that ByteDance and TikTok Global have taken action in response to (Chinese government) demands to censor content outside of China,” Mr. Blackburn stated.
The Justice Department warned of the potential of what it called the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) “covert content manipulation” on TikTok, saying that Chinese authorities could “covertly control” the app’s algorithm.
“By directing ByteDance or TikTok to covertly manipulate that algorithm, China could, for example, further its existing malign influence operations and amplify its efforts to undermine trust in our democracy and exacerbate social divisions,” the DOJ’s court filing reads.
A video with the caption “Free Uyghur” and 2,831 likes was ranked 129th on the Xinjiang hashtag page in March 2021, according to the report. Meanwhile, three videos showing Xinjiang’s beautiful scenery were ranked in the top 10 while having fewer than 600 likes each.
According to the court document, TikTok employees can use a “heating” functionality to promote favored posts on the app.
