TikTok sued by parents of UK teens after alleged challenge deaths

TikTok is being sued by the dad and mom of 4 British youngsters who imagine their kids died after participating in viral traits that circulated on the video-sharing platform in 2022.

The lawsuit claims Isaac Kenevan, Archie Battersbee, Julian “Jools” Sweeney and Maia Walsh died whereas trying the so-called “blackout problem”.

The US-based Social Media Victims Regulation Middle filed the wrongful loss of life lawsuit towards TikTok and its guardian firm ByteDance on behalf of the youngsters’s dad and mom on Thursday.

Searches for movies or hashtags associated to the problem on TikTok are blocked.

In keeping with the agency, this block has been in place since 2020.

TikTok says it prohibits harmful content material or challenges on the platform, and directs those that seek for hashtags or movies to its Security Centre.

The criticism was filed within the Superior Courtroom of the State of Delaware on behalf of Archie’s mom Hollie Dance, Isaac’s mum Lisa Kenevan, Jools’ mom Ellen Roome and Maia’s dad Liam Walsh.

It claims the deaths have been “the foreseeable results of ByteDance’s engineered addiction-by-design and programming choices”, which have been “geared toward pushing kids into maximizing their engagement with TikTok by any means obligatory”.

And it accuses ByteDance of getting “created dangerous dependencies in every youngster” by way of its design and “flooded them with a seemingly countless stream of harms”.

“These weren’t harms the youngsters looked for or needed to see when their use of TikTok started,” it claims.

Ellen Roome, who believes her 14-year-old son Jools died after taking part in a web-based problem, has sought to acquire information from TikTok that might present readability round his loss of life.

She has been campaigning for “Jools’ Regulation”, which would allow parents to access the social media accounts of their children if they die. It was debated in parliament on 13 January 2025.

“Dad and mom want to concentrate on the hazards of social media,” she informed the BBC.

“I believed TikTok was foolish dances and foolish challenges like standing in your arms and placing your t-shirt on upside-down – Jools and I did a number of of these challenges – as a result of we simply thought they have been enjoyable.

“It is not that – there’s some dangerous materials there, and I feel dad and mom should be conscious and actually, if they will, get their kids to point out them their telephone.”

She mentioned she believed it was “morally flawed” that TikTok won’t give her entry to her son’s social media account.

“[TikTok] might have handed over the info and mentioned, ‘right here bereaved dad and mom, I hope you get some solutions’,” she mentioned.

“It is taking us going to courtroom within the US to strive to do this, and I feel that is morally flawed.”

Leanda Barrington-Leach, government director of marketing campaign group 5Rights Basis, claimed this was “the horrific penalties of tech corporations placing revenue above kids’s lives”.

The households’ lawsuit comes as query marks hold over the way forward for TikTok within the US.

President Donald Trump signed an government order in January to increase the deadline for the app to be banned within the nation except bought to a different agency.

A coroner concluded in January 2024 that Hollie Dance’s son Archie died aged 12 after a “prank or experiment” went wrong at their home in Southend-on-Sea in April 2022 – and mentioned there was no proof he was doing a web-based problem on the time, as his mom believed.

Ms Dance, together with Lisa Kenevan, mom of 13-year-old Isaac, has tried to boost consciousness about potentially dangerous social media trends in the wake of their childrens’ deaths.

Lisa Kenevan, talking about Issac on BBC Breakfast in Might, described him as a “joyful, regular boy” who “needed to take care of his mum and pa”.

She mentioned he was as an “extremely inquisitive, extremely smart” youngster who needed to know how issues labored – main him to try the blackout problem.

It’s one in every of a number of viral social media traits which have resulted in warnings from schools and experts about their dangers.

TikTok mentioned in 2021 it could strengthen its detection and enforcement of rules around dangerous online challenges, and reportedly blocked some searches for the blackout problem.

Nevertheless it has confronted plenty of lawsuits and accusations from dad and mom of deceased kids claiming it advisable dangerous content material to them.

The Social Media Victims Regulation Middle helped Tawainna Anderson sue the platform in 2022 after her 10-year-old daughter Nyla died after allegedly participating within the blackout problem.

A US appeals courtroom overturned a decrease courtroom’s dismissal of her case in August 2024.