Investigation: a dozen automated TikTok accounts, registered as 13-year-olds, were shown tens of thousands of weight-loss videos within a few weeks of joining
The app's algorithm can send users down rabbit holes of narrow interest, resulting in potentially dangerous content such as emaciated images …
Wall Street Journal
Context & Ripple Effects
This investigation is the template for a method that keeps coming back: researchers register automated accounts posing as young teens and simply watch what the For You feed serves them. Two years later, the same technique showed bots signed up as 13-year-olds being fed polarized Israel-Hamas content within hours of joining (a repeat of the bot audit on war content), and the Center for Countering Digital Hate found that liking self-harm and eating-disorder videos made TikTok recommend more of them across four countries (CCDH's liking experiment).
What makes this early data point matter in hindsight is what TikTok itself later admitted internally: it tested withholding a safeguarded version of its algorithm from 10% of US users — including a 16-year-old who was served self-harm content and died by suicide (the leaked internal document) — meaning the company had evidence that safer feed configurations existed while teen-facing rabbit holes persisted.
First-order effects
TikTok's immediate exposure is its own enforcement answer: it judged that 14 of the implicated accounts did not violate its rules, which frames the problem as the recommendation engine rather than the accounts — and puts the burden of proof on how the feed treats newly registered minors.
Minors signing up fresh are the directly affected group: with no viewing history yet, their first weeks of feed behavior determine whether they get pulled into body-image content at all.
Second-order effects
The bot-registration audit becomes a reusable accountability instrument: every subsequent researcher and regulator can run the identical test against TikTok and rival feeds, turning 'what does the algorithm show a fake 13-year-old' into a standard benchmark rather than a one-off scoop.
Child-safety scrutiny compounds with existing pressure — TikTok was already under US government investigation over CSAM and predator exploitation of a privacy feature — so each documented rabbit hole narrows the platform's room to argue its systems are adequately safeguarded for minors.
Third-order effects
If the pattern holds, the endgame is mandated safe defaults for young users: regulators and platforms converging on the position TikTok's own internal test implied — that a more conservative algorithm variant is technically feasible and the question is whether serving it to everyone becomes compulsory rather than optional.
Recommendation systems for minors may structurally split from adult ones, with engagement-optimized feeds reserved for verified adults and constrained, audited feeds as the default for anyone the platform cannot confidently age-verify.
The trend: Automated teen-account audits are becoming the standard external test of recommender-system safety, forcing platforms toward provably safer default feeds for minors.
A @WSJ investigation involving the creation of automated accounts registered as 13-year-olds found TikTok's algorithm pushed tens of thousands of weight-loss videos promoting eating 300 cals/day, consuming only water, and taking laxatives after overeating. https://www.wsj.com/...
WSJ's 3rd TikTok expose. The TikTok algorithm: 1/ Drove accounts into rabbit holes of depression 2/ Drove minors into endless content about sex and drugs 3/ Served 13-year olds tens of thousands of weight-loss videos * TikTok is controlled by the Chinese Communist Party https://t…
This is awful. We need algorithmic regulation to protect our children and we needed it five years ago. Come on Canadian federal government, wake-up! https://twitter.com/...
A harrowing, heartbreaking read. On a larger scale, this WSJ piece shows what my staff&I saw time&again in our own tests. TikTok&other Big Tech apps are pushing kids into dark, dangerous spirals w/little regard for their safety&wellbeing. Congress must act—w/bipartisan urgency. h…
Highly recommend this excellent investigation by @JoannaStern - looking closely at TikTok and its possible impact on young users. Some very troubling findings. https://twitter.com/...
“...once TikTok determined the [WSJ] bots would re-watch those videos, it speedily began serving more, until weight-loss and fitness content made up more than half their feeds—even if the bot never sought it out.” https://www.wsj.com/...
One of the teens we talked to posted our story on her TikTok account. TT took it down for “minor safety.” When she appealed they upheld their decision saying her video was “hate speech.” Let's hope the moderator simply made the wrong call. https://www.wsj.com/...
Someone needs to write a book called THE RABBIT HOLE on how recommendation algorithms and ARG-like communities draw unsuspecting people into dangerous behaviour https://www.wsj.com/...
CW disordered eating #tiktok “[Tiktoks] included tips about taking in less than 300 calories a day, several recommended consuming only water some days, another suggested taking laxatives after overeating.” https://www.wsj.com/...
Back in my teens we only had anorexia memoirs from the library, teen magazine diet tips, and buttons installed by our own moms. And a bunch of us never recovered. How do these kids stand a chance? https://twitter.com/...
Tik Tok responds by saying it'll try not to push “too much” such material. I guess there's a right amount of “starve yourself to death” material that can push? https://twitter.com/...
In the absence of thoughtful regulation, internet platforms are doing possibly irreversible damage to millions of young people ... on top of the damage they are doing to democracy and public health. https://twitter.com/...
These platforms are absolutely destroying our public health, the health of our kids and our democracy. At what point will advertisers, who support these platforms wholly, or lawmakers, who are the only ones who can take steps to curb their power, take this seriously? https://twit…
Investigation: The Wall Street Journal created automated accounts on TikTok, registered as 13-year-olds, and watched them get served an endless stream of potentially dangerous videos — some even glamorized skeletal bodies and feeding tubes! https://www.wsj.com/...