TikTok Faces A Huge Fine In The EU For Sending User Data To China

Summary: TikTok faces a huge fine of €500 million fine in the EU. It is accused of sending user data to China. This comes just as the US pushes to ban TikTok over similar national security fears, with Trump even floating a new “TikTok America” deal to avoid a full ban.

As if the US government didn’t need another reason to ban TikTok, the social media site faces a huge fine in the EU for allegedly sending European users’ data back to China. Ireland’s data protection commission will issue a fine of more than €500 million before the end of the month.

This follows a complaint filed by the Austrian advocacy group Noyb earlier in January. The group named six Chinese companies. This includes TikTok, fashion retailer Shein, and Xiaomi, for unlawfully transferring user data from the EU to China. That being said, TikTok can appeal the fine in the Irish courts. However, the company hasn’t commented on the report yet, so we’re not sure how it plans to proceed.

The European Union has fined several other companies for privacy violations. This includes a fine of €1.2 billion against Meta and €746 million against Amazon. The fine of €500 million against TikTok is the third-highest fine under the GDPR laws.

TikTok’s ban deadline is approaching

One of the reasons TikTok is facing a ban in the US right now is because the US government cites national security concerns. ByteDance, a China-based company, owns TikTok, which makes the US government worry that China could access and study data collected from American users.

However, the Chinese government has stated that it “has never and will never” compel companies or individuals to collect or provide data that violates the law. This doesn’t mean that China has no other ways of accessing that data.

That being said, the Trump administration is currently brokering a sale of TikTok. So far, Trump’s latest plan involves the creation of a new company called TikTok America. US investors will own 50% of the company, while ByteDance and its investors will keep the remaining shares.

This new company will license TikTok’s algorithm. This means that TikTok and ByteDance won’t have to give up their proprietary algorithm completely. However, it is unclear when this deal will take place. The government set the deadline for the 5th of April, but with just one day left and no announcement, Trump might extend the deadline again.