The TikTok, subsidiary of the Chinese company ByteDance, as expected, filed a lawsuit against Montana after state authorities last week adopted a law banning the use of the medium of social network from next year.
This prohibition “violates the Constitution of USA in many ways”, the company denounces and mainly the First Amendment which guarantees “freedom of expression”.
TikTok is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, and many American politicians appreciate the platform they use 150 million Americans, allows to Beijing to spying and manipulate users. The company categorically denies this.
In mid-April, the Montana legislature adopted a bill that prohibits from January 1, 2024 the availability of the TikTok platform from the app stores for mobile phones (Apple and Google), under penalty of a fine $10,000 a day. The law will be repealed if ByteDance is acquired by a US company or a company from a country that is not considered an enemy of the US. THE White House has demanded that ByteDance find such a solution to be allowed to continue operating in the country. His government Joe Biden is discussing with Congress various draft laws to ban the TikTok app, as executive orders signed by his predecessor Donald Trump to that end have not worked.
Various organizations, from federal agencies in the US, the European Commission to the BBC, have banned their employees from having this application on their mobile phones. India banned it completely in 2020.
Other social media
In its appeal, TikTok also refers to the principle of equality: “Instead of creating a regulatory framework for social media in general, the law prohibits TikTok and only TikTok for punitive reasons (…) based on theoretical data security concerns and content control”.
Democratic politicianshave already underlined that many of the accusations against TikTok regarding data privacy, misinformation or its harmful effects on the health of younger people (addiction, depression) also apply to other social media.
As soon as Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte signed the bill into law on Wednesday, many voices were raised to accuse the state of censorship or to point out that the law will be difficult to implement, both practically and legally.
“With this ban, Governor Gianforte and the Montana Legislature are trampling on it freedom of speech of hundreds of thousands of inhabitants who use this app to express themselves, find information and promote their small business in the name of anti-Chinese sentiment,” said Keegan Medrano of the civil rights group ACLU on Wednesday. Five TikTok users have already sued in federal court in Montana asking for the law to be overturned.
Under the First Amendment of the US Constitution, “TikTok has the right to distribute information and users have the right to receive information and rebroadcast it,” said Lyrisa Lindsky, a law professor at the University of Florida.
Consequently the law “is very likely to be considered unconstitutional”he estimated.
Non-governmental organizations and Democratic politicians also reiterate that users will be able to use VPNs to circumvent the law without having sanctions, because the legislation provides for enforcement fine only in app stores.
Source: News Beast
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