Pennsylvania AG Dave Sunday is suing another social media platform alleging harm to kids

Announcing a lawsuit alleging Snapchat’s 13+ age rating misleads parents and that the platform is designed to be addictive, Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday called on the social media company to take steps to protect young users. 

Fresh off an announcement earlier this month that his office is suing TikTok over claimed violations of the commonwealth’s consumer protection laws, Sunday said the action against Snap Inc. seeks honesty in how it markets its product.

“This lawsuit and our previous actions are not about taking on the role of parents,” Sunday said in a news conference Tuesday. “It’s about empowering parents with the tools … to make decisions for their children. If apps are misleading parents about how those very apps work, how can they make sound decisions for their children?”

Snap said in a statement the lawsuit’s allegations fundamentally misrepresent the platform and the company’s approach to teen safety.

“We share the attorney general’s commitment to protecting young people online and are disappointed they have chosen litigation rather than working with us toward that shared goal,” the California-based company said. 

The company noted the Snapchat app was designed differently than other social media platforms by focusing on “self-expression and authentic connection with friends.” The first thing users see is their device’s camera, not a feed of other people’s content.

It notes that it has continued to improve and add to its safety tools, including deeper insights for parents into how their teens use Snapchat. It also released a refreshed version of its Family Safety Hub, with an interactive safety program for teens.

The Snapchat suit, filed in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, comes as a coalition of state attorneys general, including Sunday, pursue claims in a California court against Facebook and Instagram’s parent company Meta. 

In what’s expected to be a multi-week trial that started last week, the states claim Meta used harmful features to cultivate compulsive use of its apps by children and teens while advertising they are safe for young users.

Sunday’s lawsuit against Snap details claims the company used similar deceptive tactics to build a user base of tens of thousands of teenagers. It seeks a judgment in favor of the commonwealth against Snap, a declaratory judgment that the company violated the state’s Unfair Trade Practices and Consumer Protection Law, monetary penalties and court costs and fees.

It alleges Snap knowingly downplayed the amount of adult material depicting drug use, suicidal ideation, sexual content and other mature themes that appear on the platform.

And it claims that once young people start using Snapchat, the app itself fosters compulsive use by rewarding frequent users and penalizing those who take breaks or use it infrequently. Sunday noted the app includes a “streak feature” with a flame signifying the number of consecutive days that a user has sent messages or images to a friend. 

“If you take a day off, that fire goes out, and to a teenager, that is not good,” he said, adding that it plays on adolescents’ insecurities about friendships and acceptance. “We allege this streak feature puts a tangible value on friendships and influences a child’s feelings of self-worth.” 

Snapchat’s secret weapon, Sunday said, is the fleeting nature of posts on the app. When a user sends a message or an image, it disappears after it has been viewed or after a day. 

“This ephemeral component is extremely alluring and can lead to compulsive use. Yet it’s Snapchat’s biggest draw for youth. The result: about half of Americans’ teens use Snapchat every single day,” he said.

The disappearing posts may also lure some teens into a false sense of security, leading them to post things they might not typically share on social media, such as a revealing selfie.

“We all know that once something is sent or posted on the internet, it is never truly gone. But do our kids know that? And if they do, can they fully grasp the ramifications of that?” Sunday asked, adding, “A simple screenshot can turn what they thought was a temporary photo into a permanent nightmare.”

Sunday said the suit alleges that the sense of security for young Snapchat users emboldens online predators to be more aggressive in contacting and grooming children. 

“I can’t think of anything more concerning than predators having access to kids in arenas where they feel even more free to act deviantly,” he said, adding that it could also encourage cyber bullies, knowing that their abusive posts will disappear.

State Sen. Tracy Pennycuick (R-Montgomery), who chairs the Senate Communications and Technology Committee, joined Sunday and said tech companies need to be held accountable when they mislead families. 

“Parents should not have to reverse engineer an algorithm to understand what a company is putting in front of their children,” she said.

Pennycuick introduced a resolution passed in the Senate to create a Task Force on Child Protection in the Digital Age. The group, chaired by Sunday, is charged with reviewing the state’s existing statutes, assessing emerging technologies and identifying gaps in the law that could expose children to harm.

She noted the General Assembly created a similar task force to review and recommend updates to the commonwealth’s laws on child pornography. It resulted in the passage of laws criminalizing sexual deepfakes and AI-generated child sexual abuse material and classifying malicious deepfakes as forgeries.

Earlier this year, Sunday’s office pursued charges against two Lancaster County teens, who admitted they used artificial intelligence to create fake nude images of classmates at Lancaster Country Day School.

“I sat across from victims whose images had been manipulated … where we saw the real harm that can be done,” Pennycuick said, adding, “Innovation does not come with a license to exploit children … Technology moves really fast, but Pennsylvania is going to move faster.”