West Virginia Sues Snap Over Child Safety Claims and AI Features
West Virginia's attorney general has sued Snap Inc., alleging the company misled families about its app's safety while exposing minors to exploitation, dangerous content, and addictive design features. The case adds to a growing line of state actions scrutinising how platforms market their safety to children.
The attorney general of West Virginia has filed a lawsuit against Snap Inc., accusing the company of misleading families about the safety of its app while exposing minors to exploitation, dangerous content, and addictive design features. The complaint was filed in the West Virginia Circuit Court, Kanawha County.
According to the complaint, Snap largely left parents and children to deal with problem accounts by themselves and missed opportunities to identify and intervene before potentially dangerous accounts could target other users.
The filing is the latest in a series of actions by state attorneys general targeting Snap over marketing statements that promoted its safety for minors. The source notes that Pennsylvania and Texas have also brought suits.
For families, the case illustrates a widening legal scrutiny of how platforms describe their protections for young users, including features driven by artificial intelligence, and of the gap between those assurances and the experiences of children who use them.
This development was reported by Bloomberg Law.
Sources
- Bloomberg Law news.bloomberglaw.com