Internal chats show how social media companies discussed teen engagement
Internal chats show how social media companies discussed teen engagement

Recently released documents show the big business opportunity that social media companies saw in recruiting teens to their platforms and how they discussed risks that heavy digital engagement could pose. The documents were released last week as part of a major set of trials brought by school districts, state attorneys general, and others against Meta, […]

TikTok blames its US problems on a power outage
TikTok blames its US problems on a power outage

TikTok says a power outage is causing ongoing issues and outages that started in the US early Sunday morning. In an email to The Verge, TikTok USDS spokesperson Jamie Favazza pointed to a statement posted to the joint venture’s newly-created X account, which says the company has been “working to restore our services following a […]

2026 is the year of social media’s legal reckoning
2026 is the year of social media’s legal reckoning

Over the next year, top social media executives are expected to take the witness stand to defend their companies from an avalanche of claims about their failure to protect kids. The first of many trials is set to begin this month in California, when Meta, TikTok, and YouTube face claims that tech addiction harmed a […]

TikTok USA is broken
TikTok USA is broken

TikTok has suffered from extensive problems on its first weekend after completing a transaction that changed the ownership of its US arm. According to Downdetector, the issues initially spiked in the early hours of Sunday morning, but many users, including editors here at The Verge, are still reporting errors. On Monday morning, TikTok USDS head […]

TikTok users freak out over app’s ‘immigration status’ collection — here’s what it means

TikTok users are freaking out over a mention of “immigration status” data collection, but lawyers explain the disclosure is related to state privacy laws.

Congress doesn’t seem to know if the TikTok deal complies with its law
Congress doesn’t seem to know if the TikTok deal complies with its law

TikTok finally closed a deal meant to bring it into compliance with the law that should have banned it a year ago, and the lawmakers who passed that law still don’t seem to know what’s going on. The company announced Tuesday that its US service is now part of the separate TikTok USDS Joint Venture […]

What TikTok’s new owners mean for your feed
What TikTok’s new owners mean for your feed

TikTok is officially under new ownership in the US, and that could spell big changes for the video-sharing app. On January 22nd, ByteDance – TikTok’s Chinese parent company – and a group of investors closed a $14 billion deal to spin off the platform’s US operations, introducing a new slate of American executives. The Silver […]

TikTok finalizes deal to create new US entity and avoid ban

The deal ends a six-year long political saga that that started in 2020 when President Donald Trump tried to ban the app over national security concerns during his first term.

The deal to keep TikTok in the US is now finalized – here are 5 things you need to know

A new US-led consortium is taking control of TikTok in the United States, but original owner ByteDance is still involved.