Attorney General Ken Paxton (R-TX) has filed a lawsuit against Discord, Inc., accusing the popular messaging platform of deliberately misleading parents and consumers about child safety while knowingly allowing predators to operate freely on its service.
Discord, which launched in 2015, is a free communications app available across virtually every major device and operating system. It supports voice, video, and text chat and boasts hundreds of millions of users worldwide, making it among the most widely used online communication tools, particularly among younger audiences and gaming communities.
The suit, filed in Collin County District Court, alleges Discord violated the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act by making sweeping public promises about user safety that its own design choices directly undermined.
"Discord has allowed and invited all kinds of nihilistic violence and evil," Paxton said in a press release. "My office is taking action to protect our nation's precious children from predators."
Huge Gap in Protections
The lawsuit paints a distinct picture of the gap between Discord's marketing and its actual practices. The company has publicly claimed that safety is "at the core of everything we do" and "fully integrated into our design process."
According to the lawsuit, however, Discord simultaneously defaulted account settings toward maximum exposure, relied on unpaid volunteers to handle its most critical moderation functions, and built a platform architecture that federal prosecutors have separately described as "a hunting ground to find, manipulate, and sextort our most vulnerable."
The consequences, the lawsuit argues, are documented and real. A 13-year-old Texas girl was sexually assaulted in her home by a predator who groomed her through Discord over several years.
To add, a 15-year-old boy was coerced into producing explicit content through the platform's messaging system and later died by suicide.
A third child, age 13, died by suicide after being targeted by the "764" extremist network, which the suit alleges operated openly on Discord servers.
Long Investigation
Paxton's investigation into the company began in October 2025 and has since expanded into this formal legal action.
The State is seeking to force Discord to set all new account safety settings to maximum protection by default, implement age verification requirements under Texas's Securing Children Online through Parental Empowerment Act, and return revenue derived from its allegedly unlawful conduct.
The filing also seeks civil penalties of up to $10,000 per violation, along with attorney's fees and court costs.
"We live in a time where the dangers children face online have never been greater," Paxton said, "and every parent in Texas deserves to know their child is protected."
Discord has not publicly responded to the lawsuit.
