TikTok Fined For Illegal Data Collection
The Chinese short video-making app, TikTok has been equally popular and controversial since its inception. It has started the trend of making short-videos with various filters and music in the background and attracted billions of users in a short span. This also led other social media platforms to make their own similar tools. While it gained genuine popularity, it also faced several lawsuits and allegations over illegal data collection policies over the years. This includes collecting the biometric and other private information from the users, including teenagers and minors. This was alleged through a lawsuit filed last year, which is a result of 21 separate class-action lawsuits filed in Illinois and California last year. According to the lawsuit, TikTok is using a “complex system of artificial intelligence (AI)” to identify the faces of their users and frame them to their data. Also, it’s being exploiting its specially crafted AI to recommend stickers and filters based on that data. Further, it’s used for identifying the user’s gender, age, and ethnicity. TikTok is also accused of sharing this data with third-parties and out to China without the user’s consent. Though TikTok denied these allegations, it has agreed to pay the proposed sum of $92 million to settle the lawsuit. A judge is required to approve this settlement, which also prompts TikTok to make a “privacy compliance” training program.
