New York Lawsuit: TikTok Gave Teenagers a Fake Safety Feature

A lawsuit filed by the State of New York said that TikTok conducted experiments in which it gave teenagers and children a "fake safety feature instead of a real one," an accusation that adds a new dimension to the issue of minors' safety on the platform.

According to the lawsuit, participants in the experiment believed they had activated the "Algo Refresh" feature—a tool that resets recommendations—but their results did not change, unlike users outside the experiment. This difference indicates that the feature was not functioning for the group that thought they had turned it on.

The case is one of more than twenty lawsuits filed by U.S. states against the platform, making it part of a broader wave of litigation targeting how recommendation algorithms work and their impact on minors.

TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment at the time of writing. This case is relevant to platforms and professionals in the field of user safety, as it poses a practical question for declared safety tests: Are they actually applied to all users, or do they remain within a limited experimental scope?

What Do These Terms Mean?

"Algo Refresh": A tool that allows users to reset TikTok recommendations as if starting on a clean slate, aiming to break the repetition of the same content.

Placebo: A procedure that appears to the participant as a real treatment or feature but has no actual effect, used in experiments to compare two groups.

Recommendation Algorithm: A computer system that determines the video or content shown next to a user based on their past behavior and interaction.

State Attorney General: The chief legal officer in a U.S. state, authorized to file civil lawsuits on behalf of its residents.