$92 million TikTok settlement approved by Illinois judge for class-action lawsuit

A federal judge based in Illinois has officially approved a $92 million settlement as the result of a class-action lawsuit against TikTok that shook up the internet last year.

In Fall 2021, TikTok users in the United States were met with a message that claimed U.S. residents who’d used the app before October 1, 2021 might be eligible for a class-action settlement payment.

Plaintiffs filed a class-action complaint against the company, claiming that TikTok had “violated federal and state law by collecting and using, without sufficient notice and consent, Plaintiffs’ personal data in connection with their use of the TikTok – Make Your Day video-sharing application.”

If approved, those who had filed claims against TikTok were set to receive $92,000,000 — but the actual payout for individual users would have been quite small. If the millions of US users had all filed, each would only receive around 70 cents.

Months later, a federal judge has approved the settlement, awarding a whopping $92 million to American users who’d made videos on the app prior to September 30, 2021.

However, it looks like Illinois residents are set to receive the lion’s share of this payout, as two classes of plaintiffs were laid out by the suit — one for Illinois-based users, and one for those in the other 49 states.

Why are Illinois users receiving more money from the TikTok settlement?

Illinois users are slated to receive the same amount as other American residents, but with five additional shares each due to the state’s Biometric Information Privacy Act.

According to a press release outlining the settlement details, TikTok had reportedly violated both Federal law and the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act.

The Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act provides protections for the distribution of user’s biometric information. As stated in the press release, TikTok had purportedly collected this date and shared it with third parties.

Plaintiff representative Elizabeth Fegan explained the lawsuit in a statement:

“In this class action suit, we alleged that TikTok’s technological sophistication enabled them to collect billions of user attributes, ranging from eye color to people’s facial expressions and physical gestures and use that data without disclosure to the consumers.”

Who is eligible for payment from the TikTok class action lawsuit?

Those eligible for payments include users who filed a claim to be part of the suit prior to March 1, 2022 and had created videos on the app prior to September 30, 2021.

Plaintiffs will receive their settlement funds via electronic payment unless otherwise specified.

This massive payout follows a slew of other lawsuits against the company — several of which are from grieving parents who claim their children died after watching dangerous challenges on the app.