TikTok tells top Iowa court the state lacks jurisdiction in fraud suit

DES MOINES, Iowa (CN) — TikTok urged the Iowa Supreme Court on Friday to rule that the state lacks jurisdiction to hear a complaint over the availability of harmful content on the China-based social media platform.

Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird sued TikTok in January 2024 claiming the app violates the Iowa Consumer Fraud Act by misrepresenting the frequency of profanity, sexual content and nudity available to teenage users.

Lawyers for TikTok told justices of the Iowa’s highest court that the state’s argument would amount to a blank check for jurisdiction, prompting pushback from Iowa Supreme Court Justice Christopher McDonald.

“Why is that wrong?" the justice asked. “You have a company that wants to have an international business, including doing business in the state of Iowa. It doesn’t strike me that it would be unforeseeable or unfair that they should be held to account for their business practices in all the places where they do business.”

“The problem with that, your honor, is constitutional,” answered Emily Ullman, from Covington & Burling in Washington, D.C., which represents TikTok. She said recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings have been specific that simply being a large international company does business in all 50 states “is constitutionally insufficient to generate jurisdiction.”

Iowa Solicitor General Eric Wessan, representing the state, argued that because TikTok users have a direct connection with the app, Iowa clearly has jurisdiction in this case.

“Hundreds of thousands of Iowans have the TikTok app, and these Iowans download the app and engage in exchange for consideration," Wessan said. “In return for being able to access the content they seek, content is served to them by a carefully curated algorithm that is intended to appeal to them to encourage them to use the app.” Those users allow TikTok to “hoover up reams of their data due to their location in Iowa.”

TikTok’s ownership has been in question since Congress moved to ban it from doing business in the United States based on concerns its Chinese owner, ByteDance, allows China to spy on U.S. subscribers. President Donald Trump used an executive order in September allowing the app to continue operating in the United States provided ByteDance sells most of its U.S. stake to American investors.

The social media giant is asking the Iowa Supreme Court to reverse an August 2024 [ruling](http://TikTok can’t duck Iowa suit claiming it promotes mature content to minors) that the trial court has jurisdiction to hear the state’s suit, calling TikTok “a global company that profits from Iowans’ use of its product." The 12+ age rating for the app on the iPhone, Google and Microsoft app stores can be considered a misleading advertisement about the content of the app, the trial court said.

TikTok’s interlocutory appeal does not address the merits of the state’s case but instead focuses on whether the lower court has jurisdiction in the first place.

In order for a court to hear a civil case under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment, a party bringing an action must establish that it has certain minimum contacts in the forum where the court sits. In this case, the trial court held that it has personal jurisdiction over TikTok because Iowans agree to the platform’s terms of service.

TikTok argues in a brief filed with the Iowa Supreme Court that the terms users must accept have no impact on whether the challenged statements in the app stores’ questionnaires are deceptive or unfair under the Iowa Consumer Fraud Act. Thus, it argues, agreeing to terms of service does not establish the necessary connection between TikTok and Iowa.

TikTok cites U.S. Supreme Court precedent to argue that a party must make contact with the forum state itself, not with persons who reside there and not by unilateral activity of another party, such as TikTok users. “A contrary approach would result in a roving form of jurisdiction that may travel from state to state with a potential plaintiff — a result that precedents squarely foreclose,” TikTok states in its brief.

Bird filed a brief in response, insisting that the lower court correctly exercised jurisdiction over the case because TikTok has substantial contacts with Iowa.

“When an Iowa consumer downloads the application, the consumer and TikTok enter a continuing contractual relationship that imposes many ongoing obligations,” the state argues in its brief. “TikTok gives the consumer, on a continuing basis, access to its platform. The consumer allows TikTok to collect data about his usage of the platform—including, importantly, data about his location. The user’s permission to TikTok to collect that location data is critical, because TikTok’s entire business model is built around using this information to target advertisements to users.”

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