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TikTok has filed a federal lawsuit towards Montana in response to a not too long ago handed state regulation that may ban the widespread video service in the state.
The lawsuit, filed Monday in the United States District Court for the District of Montana, is meant to “forestall the state of Montana from unlawfully banning TikTok,” attorneys for the app’s father or mother firm, Bytedance wrote.
“Montana’s ban abridges freedom of speech in violation of the First Amendment, violates the U.S. Constitution in a number of different respects, and is preempted by federal regulation,” the attorneys stated.
Last week, Montana turned the first U.S. state to ban TikTok over allegations that the Chinese authorities can use the app for intelligence gathering operations. When the ban comes into impact on Jan. 1, 2024, Apple and Google’s app shops is not going to be legally allowed to supply TikTok to customers in Montana, though it is unclear how these firms might be ready to implement the ban.
Montana governor Greg Gianforte described the ban as “vital measure” meant to advance “our shared precedence to defend Montanans from Chinese Communist Party surveillance.”
TikTok disputes Montana’s allegations that the Chinese authorities “may entry knowledge about TikTok customers, and that TikTok exposes minors to dangerous on-line content material,” the lawsuit stated.
“Yet the State cites nothing to help these allegations, and the State’s naked hypothesis ignores the actuality that Plaintiff has not shared, and wouldn’t share, U.S. person knowledge with the Chinese authorities, and has taken substantial measures to defend the privateness and safety of TikTok customers, together with by storing all U.S. person knowledge by default in the United States and by erecting safeguards to defend U.S. person knowledge,” the attorneys added.
TikTok has been underneath hearth from U.S. lawmakers over its alleged ties to the Chinese Government. Shou Zi Chew, TikTok’s CEO, withstood robust questioning from politicians in March, and tried to assuage their considerations by highlighting the firm’s work with U.S. tech big Oracle to develop infrastructure in Texas meant to retailer and course of folks’s knowledge in the nation.
With the lawsuit, TikTok hopes that the court docket finds Montana’s ban “unconstitutional and preempted by federal regulation.”
Watch: Banning TikTok at a state level ‘doesn’t make sense,” says Craft Ventures David Sacks