ByteDance has been ordered by the Supreme People’s Court of China to pay approximately 82.67 million yuan (around US$11.3 million) to Chinese firm Meishe Technology due to allegations of code plagiarism.

Judicial findings revealed that the reused code accounted for 4% of Meishe’s software.

This ruling is part of nine lawsuits addressing claims made by Meishe regarding economic losses and other expenses.

Li Liang, vice president of ByteDance’s Douyin unit, commented on Weibo that the issue stemmed from a former Meishe engineer.

The engineer, who is no longer with ByteDance, is accused of reusing code segments originally written during his tenure at Meishe.