West Virginia sues TikTok for exposing minors to sexual content and encouraging compulsive use

Charleston, West Virginia — West Virginia Attorney General JB McCuskey sued TikTok on October 29 for misleading families about its safety protections while designing features that encourage compulsive use and expose children to harmful content, according to the complaint filed in Kanawha County Circuit Court.

The lawsuit names seven TikTok and ByteDance entities and alleges violations of West Virginia's Consumer Credit and Protection Act. The state seeks financial penalties, stronger protections for children, and independent monitoring of compliance with any court-ordered changes.

The state investigation relied on a comparative test: two accounts, one registered as a 13-year-old girl and another as a 35-year-old woman, tested on identical new devices. An investigator scrolled through each account's “For You” feed without searching for particular videos.

According to the complaint, the results differed sharply: the adult account received videos about cooking, local restaurants, businesses and family activities, while the child account repeatedly received sexual content and material about substance use and dangerous conduct. For the state, that shows that what parents see on their own accounts does not reflect what their children receive.

The lawsuit also challenges specific safety features: it alleges that Restricted Mode fails to adequately limit mature content and that Family Pairing does not provide the parental oversight TikTok advertises, in part because a child can unlink a paired account without parental authorization. It also points to endless scrolling, autoplay and notifications that, according to the state, prolong children's use.

The state asks for civil penalties of up to $5,000 per violation if the court finds repeated and willful violations, along with restitution and the surrender of profits obtained through the allegedly unlawful practices. Among the measures requested are age verification, parental controls and child-predator detection. The allegations have not been established by a court, and the company had not responded publicly at the time of publication.

The action adds to a state offensive on youth online safety, which already included a suit against OpenAI and settlements with Meta and Roblox.

Photo: The Independent Herald

Source: The Independent Herald