Is TikTok luring children to death?

New research shows that children who go onto the social media app TikTok and make enquiries about mental health will quickly find depressive content, and that within a few hours they are bound to see content from users expressing the will to kill themselves. That research from Amnesty Tech is entitled “Dragged Into the Rabbit Hole”. The organisation says the findings highlight TikTok’s ongoing failure to address its systemic design risks affecting children and young people, and also illustrate the failings of the European Union’s Digital Services Act. Since 2023, the act requires platforms to identify and mitigate systemic risks to children’s rights. In Perspective, we spoke to Lauren Armistead, deputy director at Amnesty Tech.