TikTok Not Liable for Death of Girl in ‘Blackout Challenge’, US Court Says

TikTok received dismissal of a lawsuit accusing it of inflicting the dying of a 10-year-old woman by selling a lethal “blackout challenge” that inspired folks to choke themselves on its video-based social media platform. US District Judge Paul Diamond in Philadelphia dominated Tuesday that the corporate was immune from the lawsuit below part of the federal Communications Decency Act that shields publishers of others’ work.

“The wisdom of conferring such immunity is something properly taken up with Congress, not the courts,” Diamond wrote.

Jeffrey Goodman, a lawyer for the woman’s mom, Tawainna Anderson, mentioned in a press release that the household would “continue to fight to make social media safe so that no other child is killed by the reckless behavior of the social media industry.”

TikTok didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.

Anderson sued TikTok and its Chinese dad or mum firm ByteDance in May, saying the corporate’s algorithm confirmed her daughter, Nylah Anderson, a video suggesting the blackout problem.

In December 2021, Nylah tried the blackout problem utilizing a handbag strap hung in her mom’s closet, shedding consciousness, and struggling extreme accidents, based on the lawsuit. She was rushed to a hospital however died 5 days later.

TikTok and ByteDance moved to dismiss the case, saying that below Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, they might not be held chargeable for publishing third-party content material. Diamond, whereas saying that the circumstances have been “tragic,” agreed.

TikTok and different social media corporations, together with Facebook and Instagram dad or mum Meta and YouTube dad or mum Alphabet, are going through a rising variety of lawsuits across the nation looking for to carry them chargeable for inflicting younger folks to grow to be hooked on their merchandise, and in some instances inflicting hurt together with consuming problems, self-injury and suicide.

A federal judicial panel earlier this month consolidated dozens of such instances in a brand new mass tort in a federal court docket in Oakland, California.
© Thomson Reuters 2022