• by Wendy Davis , February 11, 2026

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton claims in a new lawsuit that Snap violates a state consumer protection law by duping parents about Snapchat's content as well as its allegedly addictive design features.

"Snap tells Texas parents and their children that mature content on its platform, including drugs, nudity, alcohol, and profanity, is 'infrequent' and 'mild.' Those representations are lies," Paxton alleges in a complaint brought Wednesday in Collin County District Court.

He also claims Snap "knowingly deceives Texas consumers about the damage its app causes to young users, adding that the company allegedly designed the app "to be highly addictive, especially to children and teens."

The complaint additionally claims Snap violates a state law by allegedly disclosing minors' identifying information to advertisers and other third parties without first obtaining parental consent.

A company spokesperson said the complaint "fundamentally distorts how our platform works."

Snap has "implemented strong safeguards, introduced safety tutorials and resources, partnered with experts," and invested in features to support users' safety and privacy, the spokesperson said.

Paxton's complaint cites several allegedly addictive features, such as posts that quickly vanish, and content that scrolls automatically.

Content that disappears quickly "drives addiction by causing young users to return frequently to the app or risk missing out on content," the complaint alleges.

"Infinite scroll also drives behavioral addiction by keeping users on the platform for long periods of time as they view a never-ending stream of content," Paxton adds.

Those and other design features "predictably lead to behavioral addiction among young users, which affects their mental and physical health," he alleges.

"Snap is aware of this, but does not warn Snap users or their parents about them, and instead, it affirmatively represents that Snapchat is safe and appropriate for young users," the complaint states.

Paxton also alleges that Snap wrongly represents that its content is safe for minors.

"As part of its intentional marketing of its app as safe, Snap assigns itself a “12+” rating in the Apple App Store and a “T for Teen” rating in the Google Play and Microsoft Stores," the complaint alleges.

"These age ratings are highly deceptive -- both because Snapchat hosts enormous amounts of mature content and facilitates dangerous activities and because of the psychologically harmful features of Snapchat," the complaint states.

For instance, according to the complaint, Snapchat's "ephemeral design, which quickly deletes users’ messages, allows and encourages young people to exchange sexual content."

Paxton is seeking monetary penalties and an injunction requiring Snap to refrain from making deceptive statements about the app, and from disclosing minors' identifying information without parental consent.

Snap is separately facing sprawling litigation in California over claims that it harms young people's mental health. YouTube, Meta and TikTok are also facing such claims.