TikTok Hit By Patent Suit Over ‘For You’ Page’s Ranking System

TikTok Inc. faces a lawsuit alleging it infringed Virtual Creative Artists LLC’s patent for an electronic, multimedia content exchange.

VCA sued TikTok in the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, accusing the social media giant of operating an online platform that violates VCA’s exclusive right to commercialize its patented process for fielding media submissions, storing them in a computer, offering them to an audience for review, then rewarding end users for their submissions. It is seeking damages and interest for the alleged infringement.

The complaint identifies TikTok’s “For You” feed as evidence of direct infringement, because the ...