PARIS 

French Education Minister Edouard Geffray said on Thursday that he has filed a criminal complaint against the algorithm of the Chinese social media platform TikTok, alleging it promotes content encouraging suicide.

Speaking on France Inter, the official evaluated the platform’s impact on users and said the complaint was submitted to the Paris public prosecutor’s office on grounds that the algorithm “encourages suicide” and “transfers illegal data.”

He also shared the details of an experiment conducted by his ministry, in which a test account was created posing as a 14-year-old user.

According to Geffray, within 20 minutes, despite not liking any content, the account was exposed to depressive and suicide-related videos.

“We must stop these deadly spirals that lead teenagers toward paths that are dangerous for their lives,” he stressed.

*Writing by Merve Berker