TikTok Docs Show Fast Addiction, Stripping Teens: Reports

Last week, more than a dozen states and the District of Columbia sued TikTok, claiming the social media platform is addictive for children. Now, a deeper dive into the "TikTok documents," which show just how much TikTok knew about the app's effects on kids and teens, revealed after NPR and Kentucky Public Radio got their hands on 30 secret pages of redacted sections from the state of Kentucky's complaint. The entire Kentucky suit has since been sealed by a state judge after NPR's and KPR's reports. Some of the findings:

• Addiction sets in fast: TikTok itself has determined it takes about 260 videos fed to users through the platform's algorithm for someone to get addicted, reports NPR. Because TikTok videos are so short, however, "and are played for viewers in rapid-fire succession, automatically," per Kentucky state investigators, an average user can become addicted to the app in just 35 minutes.

• Attractiveness: An internal report viewed by Kentucky investigators showed that TikTok finagled its algorithm so that users' feeds would be flooded with beautiful people, taking "active steps to promote a narrow beauty norm even though it could negatively impact their Young Users," the investigators wrote in one of the redacted sections.
• 'Arms race for attention': That's what one internal probe in 2021 found the app is embroiled in, and it appears to be winning that race among the younger set: The investigation found that 95% of smartphone users under the age of 17 logged onto TikTok at least once a month. Tests conducted by TikTok found that tools designed to help limit kids' use of the app barely moved the needle.
• Overuse: The documents revealed that TikTok was aware of how the app "interferes with essential personal responsibilities like sufficient sleep, work/school responsibilities, and connecting with loved ones." One anonymous company exec noted that the app keeps kids from "sleep, and eating, and moving around the room, and looking at someone in the eyes." That executive said kids flocked to the app because TikTok's algorithm is "really good," per the AP, which also saw the redacted parts of the complaint.
• Forbes: That outlet notes that NPR's reporting confirms its own, including a 2022 report titled "How TikTok Live Became 'a Strip Club Filled With 15-Year-Olds.'" That's reportedly how young some of the users were who were taking their clothes off on TikTok LIVE, where TikTok officials were said to have found there was "a high" number of underage livestreamers who were receiving digital "gifts" from viewers for their efforts.
• TikTok: The platform isn't happy that the redacted sections of Kentucky's complaint were revealed to the public. "It is highly irresponsible of NPR to publish information that is under a court seal," a company rep said in a statement last week, per NPR. "Unfortunately, this complaint cherry-picks misleading quotes and takes outdated documents out of context to misrepresent our commitment to community safety."

(More TikTok stories.)