K.S. hospitalized with heart failure after TikTok algorithm repeatedly pushed anorexia content to 13-year-old

Summary

K.S., a 13-year-old girl from Virginia, was hospitalized on January 24, 2022 after developing a severe eating disorder driven by TikTok's recommendation algorithm. Her mother had searched for healthy recipes and fitness content, but TikTok's algorithm began flooding K.S.'s feed with eating disorder-promoting videos. K.S. was admitted to hospital with a resting heart rate of 40-44 beats per minute — critically below the normal range of 60-100 — and underwent a 16-day re-feeding program. Her mother repeatedly deleted TikTok from K.S.'s phone only to find it reinstalled. Screenshots showed TikTok pushing eating disorder content to the minor without any search or input from the user. K.S. and her parents filed a personal injury lawsuit against TikTok and ByteDance in Los Angeles in 2022. The case is part of the Social Media Adolescent Addiction/Personal Injury Products Liability MDL.