AG Letitia James Leads Bi-Partisan Coalition in Suit Against TikTok

Another Milestone in her Quest to Advocate for the Unprotected,
Corporate Giant Harming Mental Health of Young People

At the start of her career Letitia James, as an assistant public defender on staff in the New York Assistant Attorney General in the Brooklyn regional office, vowed to stand up for children, working families, women, the underserved, and the people of New York City, “particularly those who are ignored.” And she has successfully spoke Truth to Power with results in her quests, even now as New York State’s Attorney General.

James, with California Attorney General Rob Bonta, is leading a bipartisan coalition of 14 AGs filing lawsuits against social media platform TikTop for allegedly misleading the public about the safety of its platform and harming young people’s mental health, that the corporate giant’s features are harmful and addictive to children. The AGS also called out TikTok for collecting children’s data without consent, demanded that the behemoth change its ways, and filed a suit. Three days after the announcement of the suit, NPR presented to the public leaked documents supporting the claim that TikTok, indeed, knew all along its products were “addictive” to children.

The lawsuit is Attorney General James’ latest effort to hold social media companies accountable and protect children online. Following is an excerpted version of AG James’ press release of last week.

October 8, 2024
NEW YORK – New York Attorney General Letitia James and California Attorney General Rob Bonta today co-led a bipartisan coalition of 14 attorneys general in filing lawsuits against the social media platform TikTok for misleading the public about the safety of its platform and harming young people’s mental health. The lawsuits, filed individually by each member of the coalition, allege that TikTok violated state laws by falsely claiming its platform is safe for young people.

In fact, many young users are struggling with poor mental health and body image issues due to the platform’s addictive features and are getting injured, hospitalized, or dying because of dangerous TikTok “challenges” that are created and promoted on the platform. Attorney General James and the bipartisan coalition of attorneys general are seeking to stop TikTok’s harmful practices and impose financial penalties on the social media company.

“Young people are struggling with their mental health because of addictive social media platforms like TikTok,” said Attorney General James. “TikTok claims that their platform is safe for young people, but that is far from true. 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. 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.”

“Our investigation has revealed that TikTok cultivates social media addiction to boost corporate profits. TikTok intentionally targets children because they know kids do not yet have the defenses or capacity to create healthy boundaries around addictive content,” said California Attorney General Rob Bonta.

“When we look at the youth mental health crisis and the revenue machine TikTok has created, fueled by the time and attention of our young people, it’s devastatingly obvious: our children and teens never stood a chance against these social media behemoths. TikTok must be held accountable for the harms it created in taking away the time — and childhoods — of American children.”

According to the lawsuits filed by Attorney General James and the bipartisan coalition, TikTok’s underlying business model focuses on maximizing young users’ time on the platform so the company can boost revenue from selling targeted ads. TikTok uses an addictive content-recommendation system designed to keep minors on the platform as long as possible and as often as possible, despite the dangers of compulsive use.

TikTok’s Addictive Features Worsen Young Users’ Mental Health
TikTok uses a variety of addictive features to keep users on its platform longer, which leads to poorer mental health outcomes. Multiple studies have found a link between excessive social media use, poor sleep quality, and poor mental health among young people. According to the U.S. Surgeon General, young people who spend more than three hours per day on social media face double the risk of experiencing poor mental health outcomes, including symptoms of depression and anxiety.

Some of these addictive features include:
Around-the-clock notifications that can lead to poor sleep patterns for young users;
Autoplay of an endless stream of videos that manipulates users into compulsively spending more time on the platform with no option to disable Autoplay;
Attention-grabbing content that keeps young users on the platform longer;
TikTok “stories” and TikTok live content that is only available temporarily to entice users to tune in immediately or lose the opportunity to interact;

TikTok Challenges Lead to Dangerous Outcomes
TikTok challenges are viral videos that encourage users to perform certain activities, some of which have been harmful and sometimes deadly for young users. In one example, a 15-year-old boy died in Manhattan while “subway surfing,” a trend where people ride or “surf” on top of a moving subway car. After he passed away, his mother found videos on his TikTok account about subway surfing.

Another example of a dangerous TikTok challenge is the Kia Challenge, videos that show users how to hack the ignition to start and steal Kia and Hyundai car models, which has led to thousands of car thefts. In October 2022, four teenagers were killed in a car crash in Buffalo that police suspect was the result of the TikTok Kia Challenge.