NEW YORK (BP) — After a 15-year-old Manhattan boy died attempting to “surf” atop a moving subway car in February 2023, his mother found videos promoting subway surfing in a TikTok challenge on his phone, a lawsuit filed against TikTok alleges.
In June 2023, four teenagers died in a high speed car crash in Buffalo, driving a Kia police suspect was stolen with the help of a TikTok challenge on how to hack the ignition to start many Kia and Hyundai cars.
New York Attorney General Letitia James makes the claims in a lawsuit among several filed Oct. 8 by a bipartisan coalition of 14 attorneys general, accusing TikTok of intentionally harming teenagers’ mental health through algorithms designed to cause addiction and compulsive behavior.
“In New York and across the country, young people have died or gotten injured doing dangerous TikTok challenges and many more are feeling more sad, anxious and depressed because of TikTok’s addictive features,” James said in announcing the lawsuits. “Today, we are suing TikTok to protect young people and help combat the nationwide youth mental health crisis. Kids and families across the country are desperate for help to address this crisis, and we are doing everything in our power to protect them.”
Jason Thacker, a senior fellow at the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission’s (ERLC) research institute, welcomed the effort.
“The bipartisan nature of these cases represents the widespread and growing public acknowledgement that the grand social media experiment we have subjected our kids to is not living up to its original promises and is truly a double-edged sword,” Thacker said.
“We must recognize that no technology or social media platform is truly neutral and indeed is shaping everything about our lives. We need more than simple tips, tricks and parental controls given the outsized ways that social media is affecting all of us, especially young people and children. We need an all-hands-on-deck approach to combating these ills and companies must be more proactive at putting the wellbeing of people over mere profit and market share.”
The Parents Television and Media Council (PTC) commended the effort to hold TikTok accountable.
“Big Tech has harmed our children for too long. Our country’s leaders must work to shore up protections for children online, as youth face numerous threats to their health and well-being,” PTC Vice President Melissa Henson said. “As other states like New Mexico sue Snapchat and Meta for child sexual exploitation, it is imperative that the tech industry is held accountable and begins to take digital dangers seriously.”
The lawsuits accuse TikTok of cultivating social media addiction to boost corporate profits, using several addictive features including around-the-clock notifications that can disrupt healthy sleep patterns, and streams of videos on autoplay with no option to disable the continuous action.
TikTok’s highlighted likes and comments sections, as well as its beauty filters that can be used to alter one’s appearance, can also impact users’ self-esteem, New York said in its lawsuit.
In the lawsuits, the attorneys general are seeking to impose financial penalties, including the disgorgement of certain profits and financial damages for those harmed. The attorneys general are also using state laws to combat TikTok’s action the plaintiffs describe as harmful.
James and California Attorney General Rob Bonta co-led the coalition, joined by attorneys general from Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Jersey, North Carolina, Oregon, South Carolina, Vermont, Washington and the District of Columbia. Each attorney general filed a separate lawsuit in their own state jurisdiction.
In a separate legal challenge, Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti filed a motion Oct. 8 in a continuation of his investigation into TikTok’s possible violation of Tennessee consumer protection laws.
“Despite a court order and ample time to comply,” Skrmetti said in a press release, “TikTok continues to cover up the extent of its destruction of evidence and dodge our investigative demands as we fight to reveal the truth about TikTok’s impact on kids.”
TikTok is facing several challenges in the U.S. In April, President Joe Biden signed a bill requiring TikTok to be banned in the U.S. unless its Chinese owner ByteDance divests of its assets by Jan. 19. TikTok and a group of TikTok creators are fighting the law in separate court challenges.
According to a poll conducted July 15-Aug. 4 by Pew Research Center, U.S. support for a TikTok ban has declined. Only 32% of U.S. adults supported a ban in July-August 2024, Pew said, down from 50% in March 2023. China’s strong communist arm jeopardizes the personal data of some 170 million Americans who use the platform, including teenagers and business owners.
On Sept. 9, a coalition of 39 states, the District of Columbia and two U.S. territories joined in signing a letter asking Congress to require a surgeon general’s warning label on all social media platforms.
(EDITOR’S NOTE — Diana Chandler is Baptist Press’ senior writer.)
