Five British families fighting TikTok in US courts over the deaths of their children believed to have been caused by viral ‘challenges’ on the app say the social media giants must be held accountable.
Ellen Roome, the mother of 14-year-old Jools Sweeney who passed away in 2022, appeared on BBC Breakfast this morning as she and the other parents prepare for the first hearing.
The lawsuit, filed by the Social Media Victims Law Centre, claims her son Jools Sweeney and other teenagers Isaac Kenevan, Archie Battersbee, Noah Gibson, and Maia Walsh all died while attempting the ‘Blackout challenge’.
It is claimed the sinister viral challenge encourages children and teenagers to choke themselves until they pass out and has been linked to a number of deaths.
Speaking from Delaware, Ms Roome said: ‘It’s a motion to dismiss hearing where TikTok are trying to kick us out of court, and we are trying to stay in there to hopefully get us to the next stage which would be discovery where they would release our children’s data, if they haven’t deleted it.
‘TikTok is incorporated in Delaware which is why we filed a lawsuit there.’
Ms Roome was awarded an MBE in the New Years Honours for her work promoting children’s online safety after her son Jools passed away.
She has since been campaigning for ‘Jools’ Law’ – which would allow parents to access the social media accounts of their children if they have died.
The bereaved mother has been trying to obtain data from TikTok and its parent company ByteDance that she thinks could provide clarity around her son’s death.
The lawsuit, filed in the Superior Court of the State of Delaware last year, claims the children’s deaths were ‘the foreseeable result of ByteDance’s engineered addiction-by-design and programming decisions’, which were ‘aimed at pushing children into maximising their engagement with TikTok by any means necessary’.
Jools was found dead in his bedroom after taking his own life but a coroner was unable to confirm if he was in a suicidal mood before his death.
Ms Roome, from Cheltenham, said Jools did a ‘lot of online challenges’ and fears he fell victim to a ‘dangerous’ one such as Blackout is linked to the deaths of dozens of young people.
Amongst the four parents battling TikTok is Lisa Kenevan whose 13-year-old son Isaac died after it was believed he took part in the Blackout challenge.
‘These videos seem to be all very, very innocent and all very childlike and that’s the danger, they’re just pursuing our children,’ Ms Kenevan, from Basildon, Essex, previously told the BBC.
Hollie Dance, the mother of 12-year-old Archie Battersbee who was found unconscious after being starved of oxygen in his bedroom in Southend, Essex, in April 2022, is also suing TikTok.
Archie passed away in Royal London Hospital in August 2022 after doctors made the difficult decision to turn his life support off.
Ms Dance and Archie’s father, her former husband Paul Battersbee, believe their son’s death was caused by a social media challenge that went wrong.
On BBC Breakfast this morning, Ms Roome was joined by Liam Walsh who is also suing TikTok over the death of his 13-year-old daughter Maia which he believes may have been caused by the Blackout challenge.
Maia was tragically found dead in her bedroom at the family’s home in Hertford in October 2022, just weeks before she was due to turn 14.
The schoolgirl was said to have been engaging in ‘concerning’ content on the social media platform in the months leading up to her death.
A hearing was held at Hertfordshire Coroners’ Court in March last year to consider if Maia’s online activity before her death should be included in the scope of her inquest and what steps needed to be taken to obtain the relevant data.
The court heard that in one troubling post on March 6, 2022, the young teen was asked what she wanted to be when she was older to which she responded: ‘I don’t think I’ll live past 14.’
She said in another post that same day: ‘I’m not scared of what is beyond death. I’m scared of the pain I’ll feel before it’s all over.’
Lawyers representing her devastated family said Maia was following several troubling hashtags including the words ‘broken’, ‘depression’ and ‘crying child’ on the platform.
Jessica Elliott of Leigh Day said she also had an account which featured a username that ‘correlated with the month of her passing’.
The barrister said it may have expressed an ‘intent to die on a particular date on the month that she did in fact’ die but added: ‘We don’t know anything about that account.’
‘As far as her family is concerned, that (TikTok) took up the vast majority of Maia’s time on her device,’ she told Hertfordshire Coroners’ Court.
She said the teen had at least four accounts, but the family did not have access to two of them including the account referring to the date.
‘We don’t have the full picture…We’ve only really got the partial picture,’ the lawyer said.
She added it was important to get more information from the platform to understand ‘how Maia’s online world was interacting with her mental state’.
Earlier this month, Ms Roome announce online that the original four families who bought the lawsuit are now being joined by Louise Gibson, the mother of 11-year-old Noah Gibson, whose story has not yet been reported publicly.
Today, Ms Roome said: ‘This is about accountability. We are in Delaware to make sure social media companies are held responsible for the harm caused on their platforms.
‘What happens online does not stay online. The impact is real, and for too many families, devastating.
‘This is not about banning the internet. It is about stopping platforms being addictive by design, exposing children to harm, and avoiding responsibility when the worst happens.
‘Children deserve protection. Parents deserve answers. And tech companies must be held to account.
‘We are here to make sure other children are safer.’
TikTok has said it does not allow content showing or promoting dangerous activity or challenges.
It has said it independently finds 99 per cent of content that ends up getting removed for breaking these rules – instead of relying on it being reported to the app.
The app has also said it directs those who search for dangerous hashtags or videos to its Safety Centre.
