Arizona TikTok lawsuit alleges app hooks kids, hides risks from families

Arizona is suing TikTok, accusing the company of building its app to hook children and hiding the risks from parents.

More than half a million Arizonans under 18 were on TikTok in an average month, according to company records cited in the lawsuit.

Attorney General Kris Mayes filed the lawsuit Thursday in Maricopa County Superior Court against TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance.

Read the lawsuit here.

The figure, an average of about 543,000 Arizona minors a month, covers spring 2022 through the end of 2023.

The lawsuit said the company identified Arizona as a “top market.”

TikTok lawsuit targets endless scrolling, beauty filters

Features like endless scrolling, videos that play automatically, frequent notifications and beauty filters are meant to keep young users on the app as long as possible so TikTok can make more money from ads, alleges the complaint. The state also accuses the company of promoting safety tools that it knew didn’t work, such as a 60-minute daily screen time limit that teens can bypass by entering a passcode.

The lawsuit also alleges that TikTok lets children under 13 use the app even though it says they’re banned. It says the company’s moderation misses much of the harmful content on the platform, including material that sexually exploits children.

“Arizona’s children are paying the price for TikTok’s pursuit of profit,” Mayes said in a statement.

The state wants a court order to stop the practices, money returned to consumers and civil penalties of up to $10,000 for each willful violation.

KTAR News 92.3 FM asked TikTok for a response and did not receive a response by publication.

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