A group of British parents are bringing a wrongful death lawsuit against the social media platform TikTok and its parent company ByteDance, seeking accountably for the deaths of their children and demanding transparency over what the platform showed them before they died.
Background
The five families bringing the lawsuit claim that Isaac Kenevan (aged 13), Archie Battersbee (aged 12), Julian “Jools” Sweeney (aged 14), Maia Walsh (aged 13), and Noah Gibson (aged 11) died of self-strangulation after being exposed to harmful content on TikTok, which was actively promoted and amplified by the platform’s algorithms. In particular, the parents claim that the platform selected and pushed to its users it knew to be minor dangerous prank and challenge videos, including the Blackout Challenge. Despite repeated requests, the parents allege TikTok has refused to disclose their children’s online activity data, which they say is crucial in understanding what content their children were shown and whether TikTok played a role in their deaths.
The lawsuit was filed in the state of Delaware in the United States in February 2025 by the parents of Isaac, Archie, Jools and Maia, and in October 2025, it was confirmed that the parents of Noah had joined the lawsuit. The case has reached a pivotal procedural point, and on 16 January 2026, the Delaware Superior Court will hear TikTok’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit.
If the motion is denied, the case will proceed to the discovery phase, whereby TikTok may be compelled to disclose the children’s online data, if it has not already been deleted. On the other hand, if the motion is granted, the case could be dismissed, and the bereaved families may be prevented from accessing critical evidence which may assist them in understanding what their children were viewing on TikTok moments before their deaths.
Jools’ Law
In the UK, the mother of Jools, Ellen Roome MBE, is advocating for the introduction of “Jools’ Law”, which calls for the automatic preservation of a child’s online and social media data within five days of their death in order for coroners and investigators to access it in time to understand why the child died and whether online content played a role in their death. The proposed law aims to prevent digital evidence from being lost or deleted before it can be examined, thereby preventing bereaved families from being left at a loss for answers.
The UK’s Online Safety Act 2023 granted Ofcom (the independent regulator of online safety) powers to assist coroners in investigating children’s deaths, whereby coroners can request tech firms to preserve and provide data about a deceased child’s activity on their platform. However, campaigners, including Ms Roome, argue that this may not go far enough and argue for an automatic preservation of a child’s online and social media data through Jools’ Law, which would protect potentially vital evidence from being lost at an early stage of investigations and inquests.