Attorney General Ken Paxton Sues TikTok For Deceptively Promoting its App as Safe for Children Despite Proliferation of Inappropriate and Explicit Content

AUSTIN – Attorney General Ken Paxton sued TikTok, one of the largest social media platforms, for deceptively marketing its app as safe for minors, despite regularly showing inappropriate and explicit material to children.

TikTok lied about its safety standards and concealed the truth about the prevalence of inappropriate and explicit material. Specifically, to deceive parents and maintain its current age rating in major app stores, TikTok falsely represented that the presence of graphic videos depicting drugs, nudity, alcohol, and profanity was “infrequent” and “mild.” But an investigation found a virtually endless stream of videos on such topics easily accessible to minors.

“TikTok actively worked to deceive parents and lure children onto their app despite the presence of an overwhelming amount of profane and illicit material,” said Attorney General Paxton. “Companies may not jeopardize the health and wellbeing of Texas children by blatantly lying about the products they provide.”

Attorney General Paxton previously sued TikTok for violating the Securing Children Online Through Parental Empowerment (“SCOPE”) Act by unlawfully operating its platform in a manner that puts the online safety and privacy of Texas children at risk.

To read the filing, click here.