TikTok Asks Court to Dismiss A.G.’s Lawsuit Over Alleged Deceptive Trade Practices Violation

Social Media, ,

On Friday TikTok asked a court in Union County to dismiss a lawsuit that alleges the social media platform violated Arkansas’ Deceptive Trade Practices Act.

With an estimated one billion users worldwide and 135 million in the U.S., TikTok is considered by some to be the most popular social media platform in the world.

In March Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin’s office filed a lawsuit against Chinese-based company ByteDance — the company that owns TikTok — in Union County Circuit Court.

The lawsuit alleges TikTok violated Arkansas’ Deceptive Trade Practices Act.

Among other things, the lawsuit argues that TikTok failed to fully disclose that TikTok is subject to Chinese law — including “laws that mandate secret cooperation with intelligence activities of the People’s Republic of China.”

The lawsuit also alleges that TikTok “routinely exposes Arkansas consumers’ data, without their knowledge, to access and exploitation by the Chinese Government and Communist Party” and that “TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, has admitted to using data gathered through TikTok to surveil Americans.”

The A.G.’s complaint asks the court to stop TikTok’s actions and award the state up to $10,000 per violation of the Arkansas Deceptive Trade Practices Act.

The attorney general has filed similar lawsuits in Polk County Circuit Court and Cleburne County Circuit Court against Facebook and TikTok respectively for other alleged violations of the Arkansas Deceptive Trade Pactices Act. TikTok and Facebook have asked the courts to dismiss those lawsuits as well.

TikTok’s motion to dismiss the case in Union County alleges that the A.G.’s lawsuit fails to establish jurisdiction over TikTok and fails to “allege any facts that, when properly taken as true, establish a claim for relief.”

You can read more about these lawsuits here.

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CBN Highlights How Family Council and Others Affected by “De-Banking”

Religious Freedom, ,

Last week the Christian Broadcasting Network reported how banks in America have been weaponized against conservative organizations. This is especially true of Christian groups that have been “de-banked” by JPMorgan Chase and others.

The CBN story — which you can watch above or read here — cites Family Council among the groups who have had their bank accounts closed.

At 10:29 AM on Wednesday, July 7, 2021, our office received a terse email from our credit card processor — a company owned by JPMorgan Chase — saying, “Unfortunately, we can no longer support your business. We wish you all the luck in the future, and hope that you find a processor that better fits your payment processing needs.”

Within sixty seconds, our account was terminated and and Family Council could no longer accept donations online.

Just like the CBN story highlights, eventually we learned the company had designated Family Council as “High Risk.” According to their Terms of Service, High Risk companies include:

  • Astrology and psychic services
  • Career placement services
  • Cyberlockers and file sharing or storage services
  • Companies that conduct research or testing on animals
  • Companies known to have issues with labor or working conditions
  • Companies involved in land acquisition and involuntary resettlement
  • Companies who have been subject to allegations related to human rights violations
  • Pawn shops
  • Private prison operators

The list goes on, but it’s unclear how what prompted the bank to decide Family Council fit under the “High Risk” category. All we can do is speculate that our conservative principles and our public policy work might have had something to do with the decision.

However, the Terms of Service also let the banking service terminate our account at any time for any reason or no reason at all. Apparently that’s what they decided to do with us.

It’s frustrating that one of the largest banks in the nation would treat its customers so unfairly and unprofessionally. Unfortunately, this kind of behavior may be more common than many people realize.

You can find the full story from CBN here.

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