TikTok.Photo: Drew Angerer/Getty
The nationwide probe, announced in a press release from theMassachusetts attorney general’s officeon Wednesday, will focus on how the company designs, operates and promotes its app to children and teens.
Attorney General Maura Healey of Massachusetts said the inquiry will consider whether the app worsens young users' physical and mental health.
“As children and teens already grapple with issues of anxiety, social pressure, and depression, we cannot allow social media to further harm their physical health and mental wellbeing,” Healey said in a statement.
“State attorneys general have an imperative to protect young people and seek more information about how companies like TikTok are influencing their daily lives,” added Healey.
Attorneys general from California, Florida, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Jersey, Tennessee, and Vermont are leading the investigation.
In a statement to PEOPLE, TikTok said they would provide information about the safeguards they have in place for young account holders.
“We care deeply about building an experience that helps to protect and support the well-being of our community, and appreciate that the state attorneys general are focusing on the safety of younger users,” a TikTok spokesperson told PEOPLE in a statement.
“We look forward to providing information on the many safety and privacy protections we have for teens,” they added.
News of the investigation comes just afterU.S. President Joe Bidenasked Congress to improve data privacy protections for children during his State of the Union address on Tuesday night.
“We must hold social media platforms accountable for the national experiment they’re conducting on our children for profit,” Biden said. “It’s time to strengthen privacy protections, ban targeted advertising to children, demand tech companies stop collecting personal data on our children.”
In 2020,then-President Donald Trumptried to force a sale of TikTok’s U.S. operations to an American company. However, the Biden Administration shelved the takeover in 2021, according toABC News.
source: people.com
