State narrowed case to Deceptive Trade Practices Act claims
Alabama sued TikTok and its Chinese parent company ByteDance in April 2025, alleging the app was “engineered to hook young users just like a sophisticated gambling machine.” The lawsuit accused TikTok of falsely claiming it limits access to sexual and violent content for young users to obtain teen-safe ratings in app stores run by Google, Apple, and Microsoft, and of misleading users about the Chinese government’s access to US users’ data.
The state later narrowed its case to claims under Alabama’s Deceptive Trade Practices Act, focusing on whether TikTok misrepresented the effectiveness of features such as Restricted Mode and Kids Mode. A trial had been set to begin Monday in the southern US state over claims by Alabama that TikTok misled parents about tools meant to shield children from harmful content.
TikTok settled Friday for at least $100 million, days before that trial was to begin. Alabama described the agreement as a “first-in-the-nation settlement” with a state in the sweeping litigation over social media’s effect on teen wellbeing. Attorney General Steve Marshall hailed Friday’s settlement as “a great day for Alabama parents.” He said: “Tonight, they can rest easier knowing real protections are in place to shield their children from the dangers of social media addiction.”
Under the settlement, TikTok will send $100 million to Alabama and could pay up to $300 million total if 40 other attorneys general sign similar agreements with the company within a specified timeframe. The teen-safety provisions mirror those Meta agreed to in August as part of an $18 billion settlement with US states that had accused the company of designing Instagram and Facebook to get children addicted. Under the Alabama deal, TikTok will adopt a two-hour daily time limit for teen users, restrict overnight access from midnight to 6 a.m., suspend notifications during school hours, strengthen age verification, ban beauty filters for teenagers, and offer young users a non-personalised content feed. A conditional provision expands the night-time shutdown period to 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. if other platforms also commit to doing the same.
“TikTok’s priority has always been fostering a safe and positive space where people can be creative, discover what they love, and connect with their community,” a company spokesperson told AFP. “This builds on our commitment and core objective to continually enhance our robust safety tools to protect teens,” the spokesperson added.
TikTok said it designed its platform with teen safety as a key priority and argued that Section 230 of the federal Communications Decency Act shields online platforms from liability for user-generated content.
Going to trial would have exposed TikTok to public airing of company documents and executive testimony on how it designs teen-safety features.
The company has previously settled other cases headed for trial, including a Los Angeles lawsuit brought by a young woman and a suit from a Kentucky school district. Meta, by contrast, has taken its chances in court, with jury verdicts against it in March. In March, a jury in New Mexico ordered the Facebook and Instagram owner to pay $375 million after finding it had misled the public about the safety of its platforms for children. That same month, a Los Angeles jury found Meta and Google’s YouTube negligent in the case of a 20-year-old woman who said she became hooked on social media as a child, awarding her $6 million.
More than a dozen other states, including California and New York, still have suits against TikTok.