TikTok owner ByteDance pursues legal battle against Tencent after court rules it pay US$1.2 million in damages

  • Beijing-based ByteDance said it will appeal a decision handed down by the Guangzhou Intellectual Property Court in April
  • The court ruled against ByteDance, ordering the firm to pay US$1.2 million as compensation to Tencent for violating its copyright

ByteDance asserts that its Douyin Huoshan Version app does not infringe any intellectual property rights of Tencent Holdings, arguing that users own the copyright of the content they create. Photo: Weibo
ByteDance, owner of hit short video-sharing apps TikTok and Douyin, plans to continue a bitter court battle against rival Tencent Holdings in a dispute over what is fair use in China’s cutthroat online entertainment market.
Beijing-based ByteDance said on Monday that it will appeal a decision handed down by the Guangzhou Intellectual Property Court in April. The court ruled that the ByteDance app called Douyin Huoshan Version, a short video and live-streaming platform, must cease incentivising users to live-stream Tencent’s Honour of Kings , the world’s most popular role-playing mobile game.
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