of U.S. minors now use the app at least once a day—has made the pervasiveness of the issue alarming enough to pique the interest of state and federal authorities.
inquiry about whether a formal TikTok probe is underway, but Special Agent Waylon Hinkle reached out to Adair to collect more information and told her via email on March 31 that “we are working on it.” With little effort, the user was sent login information for several post-in-private handles. The vetting process, when there was one, focused mainly on gender and pledges to contribute images. One person who was recruiting girls to post in his newly-created private account messaged that he was looking for girls over 18, but that 15- to 17-year-olds would suffice. Other posts recruited girls ages “13+” and “14-18.
Other users’ bios and comments asked people to move the private posting and trading off TikTok to other social platforms including Snap and Discord, though TikTok explicitly forbids content that “directs users off platform to obtain or distribute CSAM.” In one such case, a commenter named Lucy, who claimed to be 14, had a link to a Discord channel in her TikTok bio."PO$TING IN PRVET / Join Priv Discord," the bio said.
“That's a red flag, [and] you can absolutely know this is happening,” said King, who previously built a tool for Yahoo to scan for child sexual abuse material.
Took you a while.
I've figured out the meaning of life.
How can this be legal?