New Jersey Attorney General Matthew J. Platkin has filed a lawsuit against Discord, Inc. alleging that the messaging app provider is exposing kids to violent and sexual content and predators and has violated the state’s consumer protection laws.
Platkin maintains Discord has “misled parents about the efficacy of its safety controls” and obscured the risks children face when using the application. Discord has not bolstered its age verification process in years and allows children under the age of 13 to operate freely on the app, despite their vulnerability to sexual predators, according to the lawsuit.
Discord has disputed the claims and vowed to defend itself in court. “Given our engagement with the Attorney General’s office, we are surprised by the announcement that New Jersey has filed an action against Discord today,” the company said in a statement to Bloomberg.
The complaint, filed in the Superior Court in Essex County, alleges that Discord knew its safety features and policies could not and did not protect its youthful user base, but refused to improve them. In particular, the lawsuit claims Discord misled parents and kids about its safety settings for direct messages.
“Discord markets itself as a safe space for children, despite being fully aware that the application’s misleading safety settings and lax oversight has made it a prime hunting ground for online predators seeking easy access to children,” said Platkin. “These deceptive claims regarding its safety settings have allowed Discord to attract a growing number of children to use its application, where they are at risk. We intend to put a stop to this unlawful conduct and hold Discord accountable for the harm it has caused our children.”
Discord, based in San Francisco, owns and manages an application that allows users to communicate through text, audio, and video. Since its inception in May 2015, the app has become one of the most popular online social platforms in the world, especially among children, who make up a significant portion of Discord’s massive user base.
The complaint says that Discord designed its app to “appeal to children’s desire for personalization and play by offering custom emojis, stickers, and soundboard effects, all of which are intended to make chats more engaging and kid-friendly.” It has created or facilitated “student hubs” as well as communities focused on popular kids’ games, like Roblox.
Discord allows child users to connect easily and become “friends” with hundreds of other users. Then, according to the complaint, because Discord’s default safety settings disable message scanning among”friends,” child users can be inundated with explicit content that can include user-created child sexual abuse material, messages intended to sexually exploit or coerce a child to engage in self-harm, internet links to sexually explicit content, images, and videos depicting violence, and videos containing sexually explicit content.
“In short, the app’s design makes it easy for children to connect with other users, but also allows predators to lurk and target them, undeterred by the safety features Discord touts as reasons that parents and users should trust its app,” the lawsuit contends.
The state is seeking an injunction to stop Discord from violating the consumer protection act, civil penalties, and the disgorgement of any profits generated in New Jersey through unlawful behavior.
Topics New Jersey
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