The families of two young girls who allegedly died as a result of a viral TikTok challenge have sued the social media platform, claiming its âdangerousâ algorithms are to blame for their childrenâs deaths.
Parents of two girls who died in a 2021 âblackout challengeâ on TikTok, which encouraged users to choke themselves until they passed out, filed a suit on Tuesday in the Los Angeles county superior court.
Represented by the Social Media Victims Law Center (SMVLC), a legal resource for parents of children harmed by social media addiction and abuse, they allege the platformâs âdangerous algorithm intentionally and repeatedlyâ pushed videos of the challenge into the childrenâs feeds, incentivizing them to participate in the challenge that ultimately took their lives.
âTikTok needs to be held accountable for pushing deadly content to these two young girls,â said Matthew P Bergman, founding attorney of SMVLC. âTikTok has invested billions of dollars to intentionally design products that push dangerous content that it knows is dangerous and can result in the deaths of its users.â
One victim, eight-year-old Lalani Erika Renee Walton of Temple, Texas, is described as âan extremely sweet and outgoing young girlâ who âloved dressing up as a princess and playing with makeupâ. She died on 15 July 2021 in what police determined was âa direct result of attempting TikTokâs âBlackout Challengeâ,â according to the complaint.
Lalani had received a phone for her eighth birthday in April 2021 and âquickly became addicted to watching TikTok videosâ, the complaint said. She often posted videos of herself singing and dancing, in hopes of becoming âTikTok famousâ.
In July 2021, her family began noticing bruising on Lalaniâs neck, which she explained away as an accident. Unbeknownst to them, she had begun participating in the blackout challenge, which had first showed up on her feed weeks before.
On the day of her death, Lalani had spent hours on a family road trip watching videos, including posts of the challenge.
âShe was also under the belief that if she posted a video of herself doing the Blackout Challenge, then she would become famous and so she decided to give it a try,â the complaint said. âLalani was eight years old at the time and did not appreciate or understand the dangerous nature of what TikTok was encouraging her to do.â
The other victim named in the suit, nine-year-old Arriani Jaileen Arroyo of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, received a phone when she was seven years old and used TikTok multiple times a day, according to the complaint. She âgradually became obsessiveâ about posting dance videos on TikTok and became âaddictedâ to the app.
In January 2021, Arrianiâs family discussed with her an incident of a young TikTok user dying as the result of a challenge, but the Arriani assured them she would never participate in dangerous videos.
However, on 26 February, 2021 she was found not breathing by her five-year-old brother. She was rushed to a local hospital but ultimately taken off life support.
âTikTok unquestionably knew that the deadly Blackout Challenge was spreading through their app and that their algorithm was specifically feeding the Blackout Challenge to children, including those who have died,â the complaint reads.
The lawsuit lists a number of complaints against TikTok, including that its algorithm promotes harmful content, allows underage users on the app, and it fails to warn users or their legal guardians of the appâs addictive nature.
