Washington

The parents of the two girls who died in the United States while participating in TikTok's "Blackout Challenge", which makes a sport of choking oneself until passing out have sued the company.

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Accusing TikTok software of "intentionally and repeatedly" pushing the Blackout Challenge, the lawsuit has been filed in state court in Los Angeles.

Matthew Bergman, an attorney at the Social Media Victims Law Center, which filed the suit, told news agency AFP that "TikTok needs to be held accountable for pushing deadly content to these two young girls."

"TikTok has invested billions of dollars to intentionally design products that push dangerous content that it knows are dangerous and can result in the deaths of its users."

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The girls who died after attempting the challenge were eight and nine years old and used a rope and a dog leash. 

Their parents have accused TikTok of using its algorithm to promote the Blackout Challenge to each of the girls and listed similar deaths in Italy and Australia as examples.

Calling for a judge to order TikTok to stop hooking children via its algorithm and promoting dangerous challenges, they have also cited examples of harmful challenges including "Skull Breaker Challenge", "Coronavirus Challenge" as well as the "Fire Challenge".

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Several users and tech experts have also raised concerns that TikTok, owned by China-based ByteDance, has featured and promoted an array of challenges in which users film themselves taking part in themed acts that are sometimes dangerous.

(With inputs from agencies)

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