Snap says New Mexico intentionally friended alleged child predators, then blamed the company

Snap Inc. says the basis in a scathing lawsuit that suggests it systematically promotes teenagers’ accounts to child predators is to the contrary, and the company is now facing a lawsuit by the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office that recommends it. They accuse him of intentionally seeking out such accounts before the attack took place. The company said the AG’s lawsuit is based on “material misstatements” and excerpts from Snap’s internal documents.

In a motion to dismiss filed Thursday, Snap said that Auditor Raul Torrez’s complaint makes “manifestly false” allegations and that, among other things, the auditor’s office created a decoy account for a 14-year-old. He said that the agency had misrepresented its own undercover investigation. Torres said Snap violated state tort and public nuisance laws by misleading users about the safety and ephemerality of “disappearing” messages, which allowed abusers to post exploitative images of minors. They claim that they can now collect and preserve them.

But contrary to the state’s explanation, Snap said investigators sent friend requests from decoy accounts to “obviously targeted usernames, including ‘nudedude_22,’ ‘teenxxxxxxx06,’ ‘ineedasugardadx,’ and ‘xxx_tradehot.'” claims to have done so.

And Snap says the account it searched for and added called “Enzo (Nud15Ans)” was actually a government decoy account. The account allegedly asked decoys to send anonymous messages through an end-to-end encryption service. As the country claims, the situation is reversed. After contacting Enzo, the state said, “Snapchat suggested more than 91 users, including numerous adult users, whose accounts contained or were attempting to exchange sexually explicit material.” claims.

Snap also accused the state of internal complaints, including accusing the company of choosing not to store “child sexual abuse images” and suggesting it did not provide the images to law enforcement. He said the document’s characteristics were “repeatedly incorrect.” In fact, according to Snap, the company is not allowed to store child sexual abuse material (CSAM) on its servers under federal law, and “of course” such content is not allowed under National Missing and Exploited Children in accordance with the mandate. It will be handed over to the center.

New Mexico Department of Justice Public Affairs Director Lauren Rodriguez said Snap wants to dismiss the lawsuit “to avoid liability for the significant harm its platform causes to children.” In a statement she said: “The evidence we presented, including internal documents and findings, clearly shows that Snap was aware of the dangers of its platform for some time and failed to act. Instead of actually changing design features to address these critical issues, they continue to prioritize profits over protecting children.”

We believe Snap’s focus on the minutiae of the investigation is an attempt to distract from the serious issues being raised in the state’s case. We will address these issues through appropriate court filings. The harms detailed in our complaint remain a pressing concern because Snapchat’s young users continue to face the same risks outlined in our lawsuit.

The company cited several reasons, including that states are attempting to mandate age verification and parental controls that violate the First Amendment and that Section 230 of the liability shield should block lawsuits. They are asking for the lawsuit to be dismissed.

Snap also argues that the AG’s claims about Snap’s misrepresentation of its services are based on “‘taglines’ based on exaggerations (e.g., Snapchat is a ‘safe'” platform) and aspirational statements about Snap’s commitment to safety. Most of the comments are about the same, and some also say that they are neither of the above. We remotely ensure that Snap eliminates all potential risks posed by third parties (and even more). ”

Update for November 21st: Added Rodriguez’s comment.