Minnesota AG Claims TikTok Harms Children, Warns Other Platforms Could Be Sued Next
TikTok exploits children by using addictive design features, and in turn profits off their time on the social media app, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison (D) alleged in a lawsuit filed Tuesday. These are deceptive and unfair business practices that violate state consumer protection laws, he added.
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At a press conference Tuesday, Ellison said that similar cases could be made against other major companies, like Google or Snap (see 2311060042). “I think they better seriously worry about that," but “you’ve [got to] start somewhere,” he said.
“This isn't about free speech, [though] I'm sure they’re going to holler back” that it is, Ellison said. "It's actually about deception, manipulation, misrepresentation. This is about a company knowing the dangerous effects of this product but taking no steps to mitigate those harms or inform users of the risk.”
Minnesota's lawsuit alleges violations of the Uniform Deceptive Trade Practices Act, the Prevention of Consumer Fraud Act and the Money Transmission Act.
“TikTok has prioritized profit over wellbeing at virtually every turn,” said a Tuesday release from the AG’s office. The social media platform “ensnares young users in cycles of excessive use through app design features that prey on young people’s neurodevelopmental vulnerabilities … to squeeze time, attention, data, and even money out of young users by maximizing their time spent on TikTok” at the cost of their mental health.
Ellison noted at the press conference that “one of the problems with TikTok” is “there’s no reliable age verification.” Though an investigation into the social media platform continues, “we're confident that there's plenty of kids who [will] be exposed to this kind of [harmful] material.”
Sean Padden, a middle-school health teacher for 20 years, said, “Many of my students report witnessing sexually suggestive material, racist propaganda, AI-generated misinformation, cyberbullying and being subjected to unrealistic comparisons, despite the use of parental controls and/or safety measures that were put in place.”
An activity Padden said he does in his classroom is having "students take out their phones and check their data usage for [various] apps, [and] TikTok is usually near the top.”
“What I find interesting is even students that report not using the app [all the] time and hardly using the app at all, are reporting high levels of data usage for the app,” he added. “This begs the question: Is the app listening and is it potentially gathering and sharing information of our young students?”
TikTok did not respond to a request for comment.