14 states, including Oregon, have filed a lawsuit against TikTok due to their “addictive algorithm” that is harming the mental health of children. These lawsuits stemmed from a national investigation into TikTok in March 2022. The investigations have all found one root problem, TikTok’s algorithm. They say TikTok’s algorithm is designed to be addictive and hook people into their app. They do this by allowing users to scroll endlessly through content, and beauty filters, and by having push notifications. California’s Attorney General Rob Bonta said, “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.” He says that this is the reason they’ve decided to sue.
Years later, more lawsuits have been filed with the same basis of addictive algorithms. In October 2023, 33 states filed a lawsuit against Meta Platforms because they were designing Instagram and Facebook to be addicting to children who use them. The District of Columbia Attorney General Brian Schwalb said in an interview with ABC News, “Keeping people on the platform is how they generate massive ad revenue, but unfortunately, that’s also how they generate adverse mental health impacts on the users.” This lawsuit ended with Meta agreeing to pay a settlement to the states, although, as of now, nothing has been paid, payment is said to be happening in 2025.
Similarly, in September 2024, Arkansas sued YouTube and YouTube’s parent company Alphabet claiming that their platform is made to be addicting and contributes to the Mental Health Crisis. The lawsuit states, “YouTube amplifies harmful material, doses users with dopamine hits, and drives youth engagement and advertising revenue. As a result, youth mental health problems have advanced in lockstep with the growth of social media, and in particular, YouTube.” However, Google’s spokesperson Jose Castaneda responded to the claims saying, “Providing young people with a safer, healthier experience has always been core to our work. In collaboration with youth, mental health, and parenting experts, we built services and policies to provide young people with age-appropriate experiences, and parents with robust controls,” and finishes with “The allegations in this complaint are simply not true.”
TikTok, however, unlike all the other companies, is facing another obstacle; it has the possibility of getting banned in the US. Unless Tiktok’s parent company sells TikTok, it will be banned in the US by mid-January. So, alongside the lawsuit against its algorithm, TikTok also has to fight to not be banned in the US. The District of Columbia said, “The algorithm is dopamine-inducing and was created to be addictive so the company could trap young users into excessive use.” Meanwhile, TikTok’s spokesperson, Alex Haurek, responded, “We strongly disagree with these claims, many of which we believe to be inaccurate and misleading. We’re proud of and remain deeply committed to the work we’ve done to protect teens, and we will continue to update and improve our product.” As of now, ByteDance states that they will not be selling TikTok, so we can safely assume that these lawsuits will end with TikTok being banned in the US sometime in January.
