ByteDance to pay $92 million in US privacy settlement

TikTok’s Chinese parent company ByteDance has agreed to pay $92 million in a settlement to US users who are part of a class-action lawsuit alleging that the videosharing app failed to get their consent to collect data in violation of a strict Illinois privacy law.

The federal lawsuit alleged that TikTok broke the Illinois biometric privacy law, which allows suits against companies that harvest consumer data without consent, including via facial and fingerprint scanning.

Illinois is the only state with a law that allows people to seek monetary damages for such unauthorised data collection.