Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin recently announced a lawsuit against the e-commerce site Temu for violating the state's Unfair Trade Practices Act and Privacy Act. The lawsuit was filed in Cleburne County Circuit Court in Arkansas.
The lawsuit seeks to force an end to Temu's “deceptive business practices and violations of users' privacy, impose civil penalties, and provide all other monetary and equitable relief.”
The complaint cites reports that Temu asks for users' permission to obtain personal information and then sells that information. Griffin said the practice represents “a data theft business that uses online sales as a means to an end.”
Temu has quickly become one of the most used e-commerce sites in the U.S., promoting discounted products widely and garnering mainstream support. In a quarterly investor report, Temu's parent company PDD Holdings boasted that its revenue increased 131% from January to March 2024 compared to the first three months of 2023.
Related article: Is Temu safe? Lawsuit claims app hacks “literally everything”
“Temu is not an online marketplace like Amazon or Walmart,” Griffin argues. “Temu is a data theft business that sells products online as a means to an end. Today I filed a first-of-its-kind state lawsuit against Temu's parent companies, PDD Holdings Inc. and WhaleCo Inc., for violating ADTPA and PIPA. Temu is known as an e-commerce platform, but functionally it is malware and spyware. It is purposefully designed to gain unlimited access to users' phone operating systems, override data privacy settings on users' devices, and monetize this unauthorized data collection.”
Temu said it “takes privacy very seriously” and that it does not “sell” personal information in the traditional sense, but only provides it to select organizations in order to provide better, more personalized services to users.
Scripps News has reached out to Tem's parent company, PDD Holdings, for response.
