Tiktok is known for its funny videos and contests. However, after two children in the US choked to death during the "Blackout Challenge", their parents are suing the platform. The Tiktok algorithm suggested the dangerous challenge to the girls.
After the death of two children in the "Blackout Challenge", their parents sued the video platform Tiktok in the USA. "Tiktok must be held accountable for the distribution of deadly content to the two girls," said attorney Matthew Bergman. The "Blackout Challenge" is about choking until you faint - an eight-year-old girl from Texas and a nine-year-old from Wisconsin died in the choke game last year.
The lawsuit, filed in a Los Angeles court last week, accuses Tiktok of "deliberately and repeatedly" spreading the "Blackout Challenge." Tiktok has invested billions of dollars and knowingly developed products that distribute dangerous content, which in turn can lead to the death of its users, it said. Tiktok's algorithm suggested the challenge to the girls - after which they strangled themselves to death - one with a rope, the other with a dog leash.
Child deaths in Italy, Australia and other countries have also been linked to the suffocation game, according to the lawsuit. There are numerous challenges on Tiktok in which participants are asked to perform dangerous actions that they are asked to film themselves in order to then post the videos online.
Another dangerous challenge is the "Skull Breaker Challenge" where people are kicked off their legs as they jump so that instead of landing on their feet they fall and hit their heads. Tiktok, which is owned by China-based company Bytedance, initially did not respond to a request for comment.
The antihistamine challenge is just as risky. Here you should take the antiallergic "Benadryl" in bulk to get "high", as reported by the WDR. Many young people recorded their self-experiment and shared the videos on TikTok. In the "Tide Pod Challenge", participants put as many washing powder pods in their mouths as possible - thereby endangering their health.
