TikTok to pay $400 million in settlement over children's privacy violations

The U.S. Department of Justice has reached a $400 million settlement with TikTok, its Chinese parent company ByteDance, and related entities to resolve allegations that the platform violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act. TikTok, a short-form video app owned by ByteDance, will pay $300 million immediately under the deal, with an additional $100 million due if a court vacates an earlier consent decree tied to Musical.ly, the app’s predecessor.

The settlement stems from a lawsuit the Justice Department filed in 2024 accusing TikTok and ByteDance of violating COPPA dating back to 2019. That case followed a Federal Trade Commission referral alleging TikTok had continued breaching children’s privacy rules even after committing to comply with them. The Justice Department alleged TikTok knowingly permitted children under 13 to open standard accounts outside the platform’s restricted "Kids Mode," gathered and held their personal data without parental permission, failed to delete accounts and information when parents asked, and lacked adequate systems for identifying and removing underage users. At the time the case was filed, government attorneys said the platform had more than 170 million teenage users and was designed to appeal to children, yet failed to properly verify users’ ages or secure parental consent.

Musical.ly, TikTok’s predecessor, had already settled a related matter with the FTC in 2019, agreeing to pay $5.7 million and to obtain parental consent before allowing users under 13 onto the platform.

In announcing the new settlement, the Justice Department credited TikTok with making substantial changes since the 2024 lawsuit was filed, including to its ownership structure, data-handling practices and legal compliance systems. Officials said the company had also strengthened its data retention policies, improved tools for verifying user age, and expanded parental oversight features. The department said it was not pursuing further action against TikTok beyond the financial penalty.

Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate said the settlement reflects the government’s commitment to protecting minors online. "Companies that collect children’s personal information must comply with the law," Shumate said. "This resolution secures a significant monetary recovery and reflects the Department’s commitment to ensuring children receive the full protections that Congress mandated." Shumate separately said children and parents are better protected now than when the case began.

The settlement addresses only TikTok’s operations tied to its Chinese ownership structure, predating a divestment of the platform’s U.S. business that took place last year. That divestment followed pressure from the Biden administration, which had pushed for TikTok to be banned or sold, and continued support from the Trump administration once it took office. TikTok’s U.S. operations are now 81 percent owned by a consortium of investors, with ByteDance retaining a 19 percent stake. ByteDance, which remains privately held, was most recently valued by investors at $550 billion.

The Justice Department noted that the settlement resolves the allegations without any judicial finding that TikTok or ByteDance is liable.

TikTok’s penalty ranks among the largest levied under COPPA. Google’s YouTube paid $170 million over similar allegations in 2019, and Epic Games paid $275 million in 2022. Meta is currently facing potentially far larger COPPA-related exposure, with attorneys general from 29 states pursuing claims that could total hundreds of billions of dollars. A jury trial in that case, which accuses Meta’s Instagram and Facebook platforms of targeting child users for profit, began this week.