TikTok is currently facing lawsuits from 14 states alleging that the platform harms the mental health of young users and they’re not the only ones who think so. As The Washington Post reports, it turns out that Apple privately pressured TikTok to raise its age recommendations from 12 and up to 17 and up. Apple’s comments appeared in South Carolina’s complaint against TikTok and were supposed to be edited, but, oops, they accidentally went public.
Let’s see what was said, shall we? In 2022, Apple formed a team to review TikTok’s age ratings and found that the platform had “frequent or intense mature or suggestive content.” Apple added, “We hope you will consider making the necessary changes to comply with the App Store Review Guidelines and resubmit.” We don’t know all the details Apple requested because only some of the edited content was made public.
Still, there’s plenty of evidence in these momentarily unredacted documents about TikTok’s ageism. In fact, outsiders and TikTok’s own employees had problems with the work the company did to reduce content like profanity and eating disorders. It was found in one out of every 50 pop-up alerts minors in the US and UK received within a month. Advocacy group Accountable Tech found the inadvertently made public information and shared it with the Post.
The inadvertently made public portions of South Carolina’s complaint further claimed that TikTok tried to “leverage goodwill in lobbying efforts” by donating to organizations like parent-teacher associations. The company also sponsored events for politicians, such as an event for the foundation of South Carolina Democratic Rep. James E. Clyburn, the former House majority whip. For the record, Clyburn joined the minority in voting against TikTok being sold or banned in the US.
Not surprisingly, TikTok wasn’t so happy about this information being made public (it’s all behind black marks now). TikTok spokesperson Alex Horek called it irresponsible to publish the edited information, claimed “many of these issues have already been addressed” and said the company “has always enforced strict policies against nudity, sexually explicit content, and seduction.”
South Carolina isn’t the only state whose lawsuit brought up an editing mistake. Kentucky’s accidentally made public documents revealed that TikTok had allegedly found that “compulsive use is associated with negative mental health effects such as decreased analytical skills, memory formation, contextual thinking, depth of interaction, empathy, and increased anxiety.”
TikTok also allegedly knew its time limit tool wouldn’t be effective for minors (average daily use decreased by one and a half minutes after implementation). Then there was another document that allegedly said “across most engagement metrics, the younger the user, the better the performance.” Don’t you love it when companies have their users’ best interests in mind?