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More than a dozen U.S. states have sued TikTok, accusing the social media platform of helping cause a mental health crisis among adolescents.
A bipartisan group of 14 attorneys general from across the country claims the company uses addictive features to lure children to the app and intentionally misled the public about the safety of prolonged use.
TikTok called the lawsuit “disappointing” and said it believed many of the claims were “inaccurate and misleading.”
The platform is already fighting a law passed by Congress in April that would ban it from entering the United States unless Chinese parent company Bytedance agrees to a sale.
“TikTok knows that compulsive use and other harmful effects of its platform are wreaking havoc on the mental health of millions of American children and adolescents,” says the lawsuit filed Tuesday in New York.
“Despite such documented knowledge, TikTok continually misrepresents its platform as 'safe' (and) 'appropriate for children and teens'.”
New York Attorney General Letitia James said young people across the country have died or been injured while participating in “challenges” on TikTok and that many others are feeling “more sad, anxious and depressed cause of TikTok's addictive features.
She cited a 15-year-old boy who died in Manhattan while “subway surfing,” sitting on top of a moving subway car. Her mother then found TikTok videos of such activity on her phone, she said.
“TikTok claims its platform is safe for young people, but this is far from the truth,” Ms. James said in a statement announcing the action.
The lawsuit identifies certain features as problematic: alerts that disrupt sleep; videos that disappear, pushing users to frequently consult the platform; and beauty filters that allow users to enhance their appearance.
Although TikTok promoted tools intended to help people limit their screen time or reset the content served to them, it misrepresented their effectiveness, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuits were filed by 13 states separately and in the District of Columbia, where the attorney general also accused the company of operating an unlicensed money transfer business through its “virtual currency” offering.
TikTok said in a statement on Tuesday: “We strongly disagree with these claims, many of which we believe are inaccurate and misleading.
“We are proud and remain deeply committed to the work we have done to protect adolescents and will continue to update and improve our product.”
The lawsuit asks the court to prohibit TikTok from such behavior and seeks financial penalties.
Regulators have launched similar lawsuits against Facebook and Instagram for their impacts on young people's mental health.
The lawsuits add to legal problems facing the wildly popular app, which more than half of U.S. teens are estimated to use several times a day.
States like Texas and Utah have already filed similar lawsuits against TikTok, focused on child safety.
The Federal Trade Commission, a government watchdog, accused TikTok in August of violating children's privacy laws.
Imran Ahmed, chief executive of the nonprofit Center for Combating Digital Hate, said he hoped the legal action would raise awareness among parents about the risks posed by the platforms and put pressure on companies to change their practices.
But Washington will also have to toughen the law for there to be meaningful changes, he said.
“This sends a signal of growing frustration that there is no other mechanism available … to hold these platforms accountable,” he said of the lawsuits.
Attorneys general are “doing what they can with the limited tools they have, but in reality the ability of the justice system to hold these companies accountable is limited,” he said.
