10-09-2024 5:57pm

AG Platkin Sues TikTok for Unlawful Practices That Harm NJ Youth

Donnella Tilery Editor

TRENTON - Attorney General Matthew J. Platkin and the Division of Consumer Affairs announced today that after a multiyear investigation, they are suing social media giant TikTok for deceptive, unconscionable, and abusive business practices that harm the health and safety of New Jersey’s youth.

The complaint, which was filed temporarily under seal in the Superior Court of New Jersey, Chancery Division, Essex County, alleges multiple violations of the New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act (CFA). Other Attorneys General are filling similar lawsuits across the country today.

“Our investigation shows that TikTok knows about the dangerous effects of its platform on young users, and can mitigate these harms, but has deliberately chosen not to do so,” said Attorney General Platkin. “As a parent and as the chief law enforcement officer for New Jersey, I’m here to tell TikTok, as I have told other social media companies in the past, that our kids are more than just data points to be monetized to advertisers to the detriment of their mental and physical health.”

“The ugly truth is that TikTok misrepresents its platform as being safe for young users when, in reality, it is designed to turn a generation of children into social media addicts for TikTok’s profit,” said Cari Fais, Acting Director of the Division of Consumer Affairs. “Our lawsuit seeks to put an end to this egregious exploitation of New Jersey’s children and hold TikTok accountable for its unlawful conduct.”

TikTok is owned by Chinese company ByteDance Ltd. In December 2017, ByteDance entered the American market by acquiring Musical.ly, a popular video app for lip-syncing and dancing that later had to pay the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) $5.7 million to settle allegations that it had illegally collected and used personal information from children without parental consent in violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). Despite this prior settlement, in August 2024, the FTC, along with the Justice Department, filed a federal lawsuit against TikTok for continuing to violate COPPA.

Today, TikTok maintains two platforms: a restrictive one for the Chinese market, and one for the rest of the world, which mainly targets the United States. The complaint alleges various examples of how TikTok engaged in unconscionable, abusive, and deceptive business practices that are designed to hide the true purpose of the video app in the U.S.—to encourage excessive, compulsive, and habitual use of the platform by young users to mine their data and sell targeted advertising. The allegations assert that TikTok knew user safety was an issue but misled users and failed to address and remediate features that encouraged compulsive use.

Highlights of the complaint’s allegations include, but are not limited to:

TikTok knows that the recommendation system that powers the “For You” video feed incites excessive, compulsive, and habitual use by children.

TikTok populates the “For You” video feed using what it has learned from how a user has engaged with past videos. TikTok then maximizes engagement by using variable rewards to prompt unpredictable dopamine responses in vulnerable young users—the same psychological trick that underlies the addictive nature of slot machines. In addition, TikTok uses multiple features to compel usage of the app, such as filters, autoplay, endless or infinite scroll, TikTok Stories and TikTok LIVE, push notifications, “Likes,” comments, and other interactions.

TikTok deceptively advertises the app as safe, well-moderated, and appropriate, despite being aware of parental concerns. Moreover, it misrepresents and conceals the harmful effects of the app and design features.

There is perhaps no better example than the way the company misrepresents its position on safety for children than a recent string of tragedies. In 2021, reports began to surface of children dying because of the “blackout challenge,” after they watched videos teaching them how to asphyxiate themselves. The company told the press, “At TikTok, we have no higher priority than protecting the safety of our community, and content that promotes or glorifies dangerous behavior is strictly prohibited and promptly removed to prevent it from becoming a trend on our platform.” And in 2023, its CEO Shou Zi Chew testified to Congress that “safety, particularly for teenagers, as a top priority for us.” However the complaint’s allegations assert that TikTok has repeatedly subordinated young users’ health and safety to its goal of maximizing profits by prolonging young users’ time spent on the platform. At the same time, TikTok’s lack of transparency about its practices and failure to disclose critical information about the platform’s risks has prevented families from making truly informed decisions about their children’s use of the app.

TikTok disregards the dangers to young users because profit comes first.

Research shows that TikTok use by young users causes harm including dysregulated sleep, trouble completing work and school assignments, and impaired social connections. Other negative effects include loss of analytical skills, memory formation, contextual thinking, conversational depth, and empathy, as well as increased anxiety. Teens also report—and research confirms—increased levels of depression, anxiety, self-harm, suicidal ideation, and eating disorders due to social media use.

TikTok deceives New Jersey consumers about the efficacy of its so-called time management tools.

Among other measures, the app claims to have a 60-minute limit for teens. But this so-called “limit” is easily bypassed by reentering a passcode or using other simple workarounds. Despite this “limit” proving to have negligible impact, the company publicly boasted about its efficacy.

TikTok deceives children and parents about features like beauty filters.

These features increase user engagement and promote overuse of the app, despite a growing body of evidence that they worsen the mental health of adolescents, primarily girls. Using augmented reality filters to alter one’s appearance is increasingly tied to the perpetuation of certain beauty stereotypes, such as structural facial features and skin color that favor Caucasian or European features, and has been shown to contribute to body image issues, eating disorders, body dysmorphia, and related problems.

The lawsuit seeks a number of remedies, including an injunction to stop TikTok, ByteDance, and associated entities from violating the CFA; civil penalties; and the disgorgement of any profits generated in New Jersey through this unlawful behavior.

Today’s complaint follows a lawsuit New Jersey filed against Meta, owner of Instagram and Facebook, for similar behavior. That complaint alleged that Instagram and Facebook were purposely designed with harmful features to keep children and teenagers online for ever-increasing amounts of time, while Meta falsely claimed the apps were safe. Both the Meta and TikTok complaints arose from the same national investigation, which began in 2022 and was co-led by New Jersey.

In addition to the lawsuits, Attorney General Platkin also co-sponsored a bipartisan letter to Congress last month urging a U.S. Surgeon General warning on all algorithm-driven social media platforms.

Deputy Attorneys General James Greenberg, Verna Pradaxay, Kathleen Riley, Cody Valdez, Mandy Wang, Law Clerks Alan Leal, Nikolas Pham, and Ethan Rubin, under the supervision of Data Privacy & Cybersecurity Section Chief Kashif T. Chand and Assistant Section Chief Thomas Huynh, Assistant Attorney General Jennifer S. Schiefelbein, and Deputy Director Sara M. Gregory, within the Division of Law’s Affirmative Civil Enforcement Practice Group, are representing the State in the matter. Investigator Aziza Salikhova of the Office of Consumer Protection within the Division of Consumer Affairs conducted the investigation.