Justice Department Requests US Court Of Appeals To Reject TikTok Challenge To Curb a Law

Justice Department Requests US Court Of Appeals To Reject TikTok Challenge To Curb a Law

Cites wide-ranging national security concerns about ByteDance's ownership of the app

The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit will hold oral arguments on the challenge regarding the fate of TikTok in September.

Worried that China could access the sensitive data of Americans or spy on them, the US lawmakers recently passed a Bill, signed by President Joe Biden, providing ByteDance, the parent company of TikTok, time until 19 January 2025, to sell the app or face a ban.

ByteDance and a group of TikTok creators filed suits to block the law that could ban the app used by 170 million Americans.

The Justice Department had asked the appeals court to reject the challenges. The department will detail wide-ranging national security concerns about ByteDance's ownership of TikTok.

The government is also filing a classified document with the court containing additional security concerns about TikTok’s ownership and declarations from the FBI, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the National Security Division of the Justice Department.

According to the Justice Department, under Chinese ownership, TikTok poses a serious national security threat to Americans because of its access to vast personal data. China can covertly manipulate information that Americans consume via TikTok.

Though the White House does not want to ban TikTok, it wants to see Chinese-based ownership ended on national security grounds.

The department rejected the arguments raised by TikTok, including that the law violated the First Amendment’s free speech rights of Americans who use the short video app. It stated that the law addressed national security concerns, not speech, and aimed at China's ability to exploit TikTok to access the personal information of Americans.

The government claimed that TikTok's efforts to protect US user data were insufficient.

Meanwhile, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who joined TikTok told an interviewer that he would never support a TikTok ban.

The law prohibits app stores like Apple and Google from offering TikTok. It bars Internet hosting services from supporting TikTok unless it is divested by ByteDance.