Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday filed a lawsuit against Snap on Tuesday, accusing the Snapchat parent company of misrepresenting the frequency of adult content on its platform to secure a 13+ app store rating and of building engagement features designed to keep young users hooked. The suit lands two weeks after Sunday filed a similar complaint against TikTok over app store age ratings.

The latest suit alleges Snapchat knowingly misstates how often drug use, sexual content, and other adult-themed material appears on the platform in order to maintain its current app store classification. “Once they have you signed up and logged in, you are officially in their clutches,” Sunday said at a press conference Tuesday. “From there, Snapchat essentially says good luck getting out.”

Sunday said the lawsuit demands that Snapchat “finally come clean about the addictiveness of their app and take real action to protect young users,” calling the suit “a very serious legal action with the end goals of being an overhaul of how Snapchat markets and advertises its app.” He argued the company’s actions violate Pennsylvania’s consumer protection laws.

The complaint singles out Snapstreaks, the feature that tracks consecutive days two users exchange Snaps and resets if either user lapses for 24 hours. “We allege this streak feature puts a tangible value on friendships and influences a child’s feelings of self-worth,” Sunday said. He also argued that Snapchat’s disappearing stories, messages and photos encourage users to post content they might otherwise avoid, such as revealing images.

Sunday said parents lack the time to “fully explore” every platform their children use and depend on companies to be transparent about how their products work.

A Snap spokesperson disputed the allegations, telling The Hill they “fundamentally misrepresent” the platform and its approach to teen safety. “Snapchat was designed differently from the beginning: it opens to a camera, not a feed of content, and was built to encourage self-expression and authentic connection with friends,” the spokesperson said, adding that Snap shares the attorney general’s stated goal but is “disappointed they have chosen litigation rather than working with us toward that shared goal.”

The Snap suit follows the same template Sunday used against TikTok earlier this month, when he alleged the company answered Apple’s App Store age-rating questionnaire dishonestly, describing sexual content, profanity and drug references as “infrequent/mild” to secure a 13+ rating rather than the 17+ or 16+/18+ he argued was accurate. That complaint also targeted design features including autoplay, infinite scroll and variable-reward notifications, and it drew a rebuttal from TikTok citing the platform’s teen safety settings and Family Pairing tools.

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