The North Carolina Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Wednesday in a high-stakes legal dispute that will decide whether state courts possess the authority to hold social media giant TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, accountable for alleged harms against young users.
The underlying civil lawsuit brought by the state of North Carolina accuses ByteDance and TikTok of intentionally engineering addictive platform features aimed at minors while falsely marketing the popular video-sharing application as safe. However, the legal battle currently before the state’s highest bench centers entirely on the threshold question of whether North Carolina courts hold proper personal jurisdiction over the foreign-owned tech enterprise.
ByteDance had previously petitioned to have the state’s complaint thrown out, asserting that the North Carolina Business Court lacked the necessary legal jurisdiction to hear the dispute. Lower judicial authorities rejected that motion to dismiss, determining that the platform maintains substantial and enduring relationships with residents across the state. In response to that initial defeat, the technology company escalated the matter to the North Carolina Supreme Court.
During the morning oral arguments, defense attorney Jonathan Hacker, representing both ByteDance and TikTok, maintained that the social network is structured and operated as a uniform nationwide service rather than an entity targeting North Carolina in particular. Hacker contended that the mere presence of active users inside the state's borders does not establish that the enterprise deliberately focused its commercial conduct on the state.
To illustrate his argument, Hacker explained to the justices that TikTok’s underlying algorithmic systems are customized around individual consumer preferences rather than regional boundaries. He noted that while a Chicago-operated website explicitly branded around state interests, such as a "Tarheel Nation" portal, might naturally open itself up to state jurisdiction, TikTok’s general, nationwide distribution model functions under entirely different operational principles.
State attorney Josh Abram presented a sharply contrasting view on behalf of North Carolina, insisting that ByteDance cannot reap the financial rewards of doing business with local citizens while simultaneously claiming immunity from the state's judicial oversight. Abram argued before the justices that the company actively engages with the local market through extensive consumer relationships, comprehensive data collection, and direct monetization.
Abram emphasized that TikTok regularly transmits geo-targeted commercial advertisements and algorithmic push notifications directly to children and teenagers across the state. He maintained that these automated interactions reflect deliberate business choices made by the company rather than random or accidental occurrences, noting that more than one million young North Carolinians actively joined and utilized the platform.
The state further stressed that North Carolina youths downloaded the software locally, interacted with its features within state borders, and subsequently experienced the psychological and physical harms outlined in the government’s underlying complaint. According to the state's legal team, these localized damages provide more than sufficient grounds for the North Carolina court system to assert jurisdiction over the enterprise.
Following a brief rebuttal period granted to the defense counsel, the state Supreme Court justices adjourned the bench, bringing oral arguments to a formal close. The court did not render an immediate decision from the bench on Wednesday; instead, the justices took the matter under advisement to examine the oral presentations alongside submitted written briefs before issuing a formal written ruling at a future date.
The ongoing jurisdictional clash unfolds amid broader public concerns regarding how major technology companies intentionally build engagement-maximizing platforms that capture young users’ time and attention. Youth advocates and health specialists continue to warn that persistent exposure to hyper-tailored algorithmic feeds carries severe repercussions for adolescent well-being.
Mick Tobin, co-founder of the Young People's Alliance, noted that the core architecture of these platforms makes it exceptionally difficult for young individuals to moderate their usage. Tobin, a Duke University alumnus and North Carolina native, explained that brief intended visits to the platform routinely spiral into extended sessions, disrupting everyday routines and cultivating damaging social comparison loops that diminish youth self-esteem.
Tobin further asserted that expecting teenagers to resist applications engineered to maximize screen time places an unfair burden on children. He argued that the broader societal conversation needs to shift away from individual responsibility, as adolescents are ill-equipped to compete against sophisticated corporate systems designed specifically to keep them tethered to their screens.
Concerns over screen dependency are further corroborated by recent public health figures gathered within the state. According to findings from the 2025 North Carolina Youth Risk Behavior Survey, roughly three-quarters of surveyed high school students reported logging onto social media platforms several times each day, whereas less than one-quarter of respondents engaged in daily physical exercise.
Highlighting the gravity of these trends, Neil Harrington, the Senior Director of Policy and Research at the advocacy organization NC Child, emphasized that extensive research directly connects heavy social media exposure to detrimental mental health outcomes among youth. Harrington pointed to studies demonstrating that adolescents spending more than three hours daily on such platforms face heightened risks, reinforcing the critical stakes surrounding the state's legal challenge.
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