New Jersey Sues Discord for Allegedly Failing to Protect Children

Discord is facing a new lawsuit from New Jersey, which claims that the chat application is involved in “deceptive and unreasonable commercial practices” that endangers its younger users.

The lawsuit, which was filed on Thursday, comes after a multi -year investigation by the Office of the Public Prosecutor in New Jersey. The AG office claims that it has discovered evidence that despite the Discord policies to protect children and adolescents, the application of popular correspondence endangers young people “at risk.”

“We are the first state in the country to sue Discord,” Public Prosecutor Matthew Platin told Wire.

Platkin says there are investigations. One of them is a person: a few years ago, one of the family’s friends came to Platin, he was surprised that his 10 -year -old son was able to participate in Discord, although the platform that prevents children under the age of 13 years of registration.

The second is the mass fire in Boufalo, in the neighboring New York. Discord perpetrator used his personal notes in the period before the attack, and entered the massacre directly to the chat and video. (The footage was removed quickly.)

“These companies are constantly fulfilled, with profit before our children and their well -being interested,” says Platinn.

The AG office claims in the lawsuit that the dispute violated the state’s consumer fraud law. The allegations, which were presented on Thursday morning, runs a set of policies adopted by Discord to keep children under 13 years of platform and to keep adolescents safe from sexual exploitation and violent content. The lawsuit is the latest in a growing list of states against major social media companies – the litigation has yet proven to be somewhat effective.

Discord safety policies: Children under the age of 13 are banned from the application of correspondence, while it is prohibited on a broader scale of any sexual interaction with minors, including “youth”. It also has algorithm filters working to stop unwanted direct messages. The California -based company’s safety policy, published in 2023, claims that “we have built Discord to be different and unabated to make it an enjoyable and safe space for adolescents.”

But New Jersey says, “Discord has fallen, and continues to fall, flat.”

The Public Prosecutor indicates that Discord has three levels of safety, to prevent young people from unwanted messages and exploit from adults: “Keep safe”, as the system wipes all messages in the user’s incoming box; “My friends are nice”, as he does not scan messages from friends; And “do not check”, as you wipe any messages.

Even for teenage users, the lawsuit claims that the platform is behind my “cute friends”. The Public Prosecutor claims that this is an intended design that represents a threat to younger users. The lawsuit also claims that the dispute fails not to conduct age to prevent children under the age of 13 from participating in the service.

In 2023, Discord added new candidates to detect unwanted sexual content and ban, but the AG office says that the company must enable the option to “maintain safe” by default.