A Brief Overview:
- Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin’s Office is suing Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok for violating Arkansas’ Deceptive Trade Practices Act.
- The A.G.’s lawsuits allege that social media platforms are fueling the current youth mental health crisis and deliberately promoting obscene and objectionable material to children.
- The lawsuits also allege that TikTok routinely exposes user data to the Chinese Government and Communist Party.
- A trade association of social media companies has sued Attorney General Tim Griffin in an effort to block the state from enforcing parental consent requirements for social media.
The Arkansas Attorney General’s Office is currently going toe-to-toe against social media giants in four different lawsuits.
Three of the lawsuits are in state court. One is in federal court.
The state lawsuits allege that social media companies violated Arkansas law; the federal suit defends the constitutionality of the state’s new Social Media Safety Act.
Below is a quick overview of each lawsuit.
State of Arkansas v. TikTok (Cleburne County)
In March Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin’s office filed a lawsuit against Chinese-based company ByteDance — the corporation that owns TikTok — in Cleburne County Circuit Court.
With a billion users worldwide and 135 million in the U.S., TikTok is considered by some to be the most popular social media platform in the world.
The Cleburne County lawsuit alleges TikTok violated Arkansas’ Deceptive Trade Practices Act by falsely claiming that graphic and mature content on its platform is appropriate for teens.
The lawsuit calls the TikTok app “a Chinese ‘Trojan Horse’ unleashed on unsuspecting American consumers.”
The lawsuit notes that “tens of millions of minors use TikTok in the United States.” Once on the TikTok app, the Arkansas Attorney General’s office writes that TikTok’s algorithm “force-feeds” many children a non-stop diet of objectionable content.
Some of the objectionable content TikTok promotes to children includes:
- Content depicting alcohol, tobacco, and drugs
- Sexual content
- Nudity
- Suggestive themes
- Violence
- Intense profanity and obscenity
The lawsuit alleges much of this content is available to teenagers using the app’s Restricted Mode.
The A.G.’s legal complaint notes that TikTok actually promotes this content regardless of the user’s age — meaning that many children routinely are exposed to this type of material on the social media platform.
The lawsuit alleges that TikTok has deceptively downplayed the prevalence of this content on its platform and labeled the app as being appropriate for ages 13 and up when in reality TikTok should be rated 17+.
The A.G.’s complaint against TikTok concludes by asking the court to stop TikTok’s actions and award the state up to $10,000 per violation of the Arkansas Deceptive Trade Practices Act in accordance with state law.
You can read the entire complaint here.
State of Arkansas v. TikTok (Union County)
In March Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin’s office filed a lawsuit against Chinese-based company ByteDance — the corporation that owns TikTok — in Union County Circuit Court.
The Union County lawsuit alleges TikTok violated Arkansas’ Deceptive Trade Practices Act.
Among other things, the lawsuit argues that TikTok failed to fully disclose that TikTok is subject to Chinese law — including “laws that mandate secret cooperation with intelligence activities of the People’s Republic of China.”
The lawsuit also alleges that TikTok “routinely exposes Arkansas consumers’ data, without their knowledge, to access and exploitation by the Chinese Government and Communist Party” and that “TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, has admitted to using data gathered through TikTok to surveil Americans.”
The A.G.’s complaint against TikTok concludes by asking the court to stop TikTok’s actions and award the state up to $10,000 per violation of the Arkansas Deceptive Trade Practices Act in accordance with state law.
You can read the entire complaint here.
State of Arkansas v. Meta (Polk County)
In March Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin’s office filed a lawsuit against Meta — the corporation that owns Facebook and Instagram — in Polk County Circuit Court.
Like the state’s lawsuits against TikTok, the lawsuit against Meta alleges the company’s social media platforms violated Arkansas’ Deceptive Trade Practices Act.
The lawsuit alleges Facebook designed and structured its platform “to exploit multiple neuropsychological traits in youth.”
It notes that Facebook and Instagram are built around algorithms intentionally designed “to exploit human psychology and foster addiction to maximize users’ screen time.”
The A.G.’s legal complaint says this exploitation is especially true of young users with developing brains.
The lawsuit says that, “youth mental health problems have advanced in lockstep with the growth of social media platforms that have been deliberately designed to attract and addict youth by amplifying harmful material, dosing users with dopamine hits, and thereby driving youth engagement and advertising revenue.”
The lawsuit goes on to allege that Meta violated Arkansas’ Deceptive Trade Practices Act by designing and marketing “dangerous social media platforms that have injured the health, comfort, and repose of the State’s community” and fueled the current youth mental health crisis.
The A.G.’s complaint against Meta concludes by asking the court to stop Meta’s actions and award the state up to $10,000 per violation of the Arkansas Deceptive Trade Practices Act in accordance with state law.
You can read the entire complaint against Meta here.
NetChoice v. Tim Griffin
The fourth lawsuit — NetChoice v. Tim Griffin — was brought in federal court by a conglomerate of social media companies against Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin.
In April the Arkansas Legislature passed the Social Media Safety Act — a good law by Sen. Tyler Dees (R – Siloam Springs) and Rep. Jon Eubanks (R – Paris) requiring major social media companies to ensure minors don’t access social media platforms without parental consent. A social media company that violated the law could be held liable.
In response, tech giants — such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok — sued to strike down the Social Media Safety Act as unconstitutional.
Last week U.S. District Judge Timothy Brooks in Fayetteville issued an ordering blocking the State of Arkansas from enforcing the Social Media Safety Act.
Among other things, Judge Brooks’ ruling claims that Arkansas’ Social Media Safety Act is unconstitutionally broad and vague, and that most social media content is not “damaging, harmful, or obscene as to minors.”
However, ample evidence from the attorney general’s other lawsuits against Facebook and TikTok shows that by design, social media platforms may be unhealthy for children, and in many cases these platforms deliberately push objectionable content to kids.
With that in mind, we believe higher courts will eventually uphold the Social Media Safety Act as constitutional.
It’s good to see the Arkansas Attorney General’s Office proactively working to stop tech giants like TikTok and Facebook from harming children. Family Council will continue to monitor and report on each of these lawsuits in the coming months.
Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.
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