TikTok settles children's privacy case for $400M
TikTok reaches $400M settlement over children's privacy lawsuit
TikTok and its parent company ByteDance have agreed to pay $400 million to the U.S. Department of Justice to resolve a landmark lawsuit alleging the platform violated the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). The suit, originally filed in 2024 under the Biden administration, claimed TikTok allowed millions of children under 13 to use the platform and collected their personal data without parental consent.
The settlement is one of the largest child privacy penalties in U.S. history. Under the terms, TikTok will pay $300 million immediately and $100 million once a prior consent decree against its predecessor Musical.ly is vacated. The agreement also mandates stronger age-verification controls, additional safeguards for minors, and enhanced parental oversight tools, though TikTok admits no wrongdoing.
The case alleged TikTok struggled to identify and remove underage users even after a 2019 $5.7 million COPPA settlement with the FTC. Employees had reportedly raised concerns internally about the presence of young users and the company's use of their data for targeted advertising. The DOJ also alleged TikTok changed registration policies in ways that made it harder to determine user ages.
The settlement arrives amid broader scrutiny. Just days prior, Bloomberg reported TikTok had disabled algorithmic safety safeguards for roughly 10% of U.S. users as part of an internal experiment, drawing sharp bipartisan criticism from senators Marsha Blackburn and Richard Blumenthal.
The TikTok case is part of a wider crackdown on tech platforms over child safety. Meta is currently facing a separate multi-state lawsuit over COPPA violations that could result in penalties exceeding hundreds of billions of dollars, with a jury trial now underway.