Lawsuit: Snapchat Employees Were Aware of Platform's Dangers for

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The newly unsealed complaint of the lawsuit filed by the New Mexico Attorney General against Snap, the company behind the Snapchat social media platform, reveals that employees were well aware of the app’s dangers to children, including sextortion, illicit gun sales, and addictive features.

The Verge reports that a less-redacted version of a lawsuit filed by the New Mexico Attorney General against Snap has shed new light on the extent of the company’s shortcomings when it comes to protecting children on its platform. The newly unsealed complaint alleges that Snap employees were aware of issues such as child predators, illicit gun sales, and addictive features on Snapchat, yet did not take sufficient action to address them.

According to the complaint, by November 2022, Snap employees were discussing 10,000 user reports of sextortion each month, while acknowledging that these reports likely represented only a small fraction of the actual abuse occurring on the platform. In one instance, employees referenced a case with 75 reports mentioning nudes, minors, and extortion, yet the account in question remained active.

The complaint also alleges that Snap’s internal research from 2022 found that over a third of teen girls and 30 percent of teen boys on the app had been exposed to unwanted sexual contact. Former Snap trust and safety employees reportedly complained about having little contact with upper management compared to their work at other social media companies, and that there was pushback in trying to add in-app safety mechanisms because CEO Evan Spiegel prioritized design.

In 2021, Snap employees allegedly circulated an external report that included examples of predators connecting with children as young as eight through Snapchat and obtaining child pornography. However, they feared that measures to catch this kind of behavior would be unduly burdensome on user privacy and create disproportionate administrative costs.

The complaint also alleges that employees identified risks with certain Snapchat features, such as Quick Add, which suggests other users to connect with. While Snap later made changes to the Quick Add feature for 13 to 17-year-old accounts, requiring a certain number of friends in common, employees internally recognized that this approach would still have significant shortcomings.

In addition to child safety concerns, the unsealed complaint includes more details on how Snap allegedly facilitated the illicit sale of guns. An undated presentation acknowledged that the platform saw 50 posts related to illegal gun sales per day and 9,000 views per day of these marketed weapons. Even when content was reported, it was usually viewed hundreds of times before being addressed.

The complaint also highlights internal communications acknowledging the addictiveness of Snapstreaks, a feature that tells users how many days they have continued communicating with another user. Employees allegedly commented on the feature’s addictive nature, with one stating, “Streaks make it impossible to unplug for even a day.”