TikTok settles lawsuit with Alabama and pledges safety features

The firm has also pledged new safety measures for teenagers (AP)

TikTok will pay Alabama at least 100 million dollars (£75.5 million) and must implement more safety features for teenagers in the US state as part of a settlement reached just before a lawsuit was due to begin in court.

Alabama sued the social media company in 2025, claiming that the platform had negative effects on the mental wellbeing of young people.

The lawsuit argued that TikTok’s “addictive properties” – namely its algorithm that curates highly specific content catered to users’ interests – were harmful to children, and that the company knew about those harms.

Through the settlement, TikTok will make several platform-level changes for teenage users in Alabama, including an option for youngsters to select a non-personalised content feed.

Under the agreement, the platform will also bar cosmetic procedure filters for teenagers, implement a two-hour daily time limit and ban night-time use from midnight to 6am.

Young users in Alabama will also be prompted to take a “productive pause” after 15 minutes of continuous use, and again at 60 and 90 minutes.

In addition to the platform changes, TikTok will pay Alabama 100 million dollars in restitution and remediation, which will likely go toward funding youth mental health services and other programmes.

If enough US states reach qualifying settlements with TikTok within a specific timeframe, Alabama could receive up to an additional 183.8 million dollars (£138.8 million).

The platform-level changes outlined in the settlement agreement are roughly similar to changes Meta agreed to make when it reached a settlement this summer to resolve similar claims that were filed by nearly every American state, including Alabama.

Meta had called on TikTok and its other chief competitor, YouTube, to join it in adopting similar standards, but TikTok had not publicly responded.

Katherine Robertson, chief counsel in the Alabama attorney general’s office and the Republican nominee to be the state’s next attorney general, acknowledged the similarities with the Meta agreement and told The Associated Press on Friday: “There’s been a war on childhood coming from a million different directions.

“We recognise that parents and youth are fighting a battle against a bunch of different platforms,” Ms Robertson added.

“They’re manipulating kids to get addicted to their product, essentially.”

The settlement also outlines more robust and user-friendly parental controls, stronger age verification measures TikTok must take, and stronger content moderation protocols. Teenage accounts will also be set to private by default.

A spokesperson for the TikTok USDS Joint Venture said 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. This builds on our commitment and core objective to continually enhance our robust safety tools to protect teens”.

Alabama would have been the first state to argue its claims against TikTok in front of a jury. The trial was scheduled to begin on Monday.

TikTok has settled several lawsuits with similar claims filed by individuals before they went to trial, most notably in the landmark social media addiction trial in Los Angeles earlier this year.

The jury in that case found that YouTube and Meta designed their platforms to hook young users without concern for their well-being.

TikTok also reached a 400 million dollar (£302 million) settlement with the US department of justice in August, ending a 2024 lawsuit alleging the company violated federal children’s privacy laws.