Bad Influence: The Dark Side of Kidfluencing (2025) s01e03 Episode Script

1
[Ashley] After we left The Squad,
Piper's video got posted about our kids.
And that was hard.
[tense music playing]
The content on that video was
Piper, Lev, Elliana, Emily.
They were sitting on the edge Piper's bed.
And I remember Piper
going through each of the kids
and why these kids had left.
I just have to say, you know,
everyone that leaves The Squad,
they always blame it on a toxic,
you know, place, environment.
It's really not. We're all
really, really good friends.
And we have a lot of fun.
[Hunter] I'm not gonna
sit here and let people say
that we're a toxic place.
You could tell Piper is
Piper's uncomfortable.
This was very coached.
[Hunter] There's not
me telling no adult.
There's no one controlling Piper, I swear.
[Ashley] And now that I've been
on the other side of these videos,
you could tell that she
was being very coached.
In the video, she also
unfollowed each of our kids.
I'm on The Squad following page,
and we're going to
unfollow them right now.
First one here is Claire.
Obviously, you know, she's my cousin,
and we've had very, very,
very fun times together.
So our kids sat there and watched this,
and watched the wrath
of what was happening.
And the comments
The hate comments were horrible.
[Claire] I was only 13,
and I was getting hate
from all across the world.
I was in such a vulnerable place
where I was really
internalizing what I was seeing.
[Angela] These kids were being attacked.
Like I call them, "the hate campaigns."
I don't know if they were
orchestrated by Tiffany or bots,
or if they were real kids, but
they were being attacked online.
You think about kids in middle
America, and they get bullied.
This is a different level of bullying.
This is not just 100 kids in your town.
This is the whole world.
It definitely hurt a lot to see
everything everybody was saying.
It felt like I was being
judged and criticized.
[Sophie] I feel anger
towards the situation
'cause people will tag me in
what "Piper said about me."
And it's like, I know that's Tiffany.
And you're lying to these fans,
saying that that's your daughter
talking, and it's not, it's you.
[Heather] Tiffany is on her phone,
talking shit to children
under Piper's account.
And she'd go into group chats.
She would start hate campaigns to go
after whoever left The Squad at that time,
and just setting up fan accounts.
[Ashley] We know for a fact
Tiffany was running fan accounts
to speak ill of The
Squad members that left.
[Angela] My son is so devastated.
I just would like her to stop.
[voice breaks] Leave my kid
alone. Leave these kids alone.
Focus on your own.
Just leave our kids alone.
[intriguing electronic music playing]
[bubbling]
[rising whir]
[ethereal whirring]
[music fades]
[mouse clicking]
[Angela] After we left The Squad,
all of the kids' social media,
especially their YouTube,
was just tanking and getting no views.
I was emailing YouTube
and talking to people on
Fiverr, trying to do SEO.
I was trying to figure out what
had happened to Sawyer's channel.
[man] When did you
start losing subscribers?
So basically, Sawyer
left on 15th February.
And then, within two days,
now we're losing subscribers.
And hundreds of subscribers a day.
Yeah. This is a a
really unusual falloff.
Um I would not expect to
see, like, such a a strong cutoff,
unless there was an active campaign,
where, you know, somebody an influencer
with influence over their audience
would say, "Hey, go
unsubscribe to this channel," right?
We've seen that many times.
But in this, for us, going
negative within two days,
the audience didn't even
know that Sawyer had left.
They were eventually
told to unsubscribe, but
Fans didn't know Sawyer
had left The Squad at this point.
Yeah. Only, you know, Hunter and Tiffany.
[intriguing music playing]
[Ashley] We felt like they
were doing this to our channels.
When Claire's channel
numbers started going down,
that's whenever I thought,
"Oh no. Here we go."
We had multiple phone
calls between the parents.
You know, here's Claire's analytics.
Here's these other kids' analytics.
And it was the same
graph for all the kids.
[Jenn] A few of the moms spent months
and months and months researching
how to stop Tiffany.
The goal was to figure out
what she's doing to our channels
and reverse it.
[Angela] We're sharing information,
trying to figure this out together.
[Jenn] We talked to
many different entities.
And finally, we were directed
to the law firm that we work with.
[music fades]
[man] Tiffany and her boyfriend
slash business partner, Hunter,
they've said in the past
that they have the ability,
and they have in the past done
these kinds of things to other people.
[somber music playing]
[Corinne] I was the first
person it happened to.
And now everybody knows,
if you leave The Squad,
your views will go down,
you'll lose subscribers,
you'll lose followers.
You're going to get blacklisted.
[Sawyer] As soon as I left,
Hunter went in and turned off
the notifications on my channel.
And then we logged him out.
And he just went crazy
trying to log back in,
trying to get the password from us.
[Taylor] There's a
whole world of dark arts
that goes behind these channels.
And it's an entire underbelly
of the social media ecosystem
that you don't see.
You know, behind the scenes, there's
these people buying bot networks,
paying people to mass report accounts,
get them flagged, get them down-ranked.
[Sawyer] Which would be
going in on different accounts
and clicking "report the video."
And we know that's been done
because some of the videos,
you can't even put a
Google ad on to promote
because YouTube thinks it's violent,
when it's, like, a video
of me and my friends
sitting down talking on the couch.
[inaudible]
We found out later on
that the videos were being embedded
in porn sites and gambling sites
and other bad sites
that would negatively affect
the SEO of my YouTube channel.
[Matt] If your name is linked
to one of these porn sites,
it's gonna impact, you know,
hits when it comes to subscribers.
It's gonna show up on a Google search.
And that's going to adversely
impact your name forever.
The Internet is written in
ink. It's not written in pencil.
[Sawyer] My YouTube channel
has never been the same.
I think it's forever tarnished.
Everything I worked for.
Hey, guys. I'm Sawyer.
And I just started my YouTube
channel a couple days ago.
Everything that I cared about
and was motivated to work on,
getting sabotaged by people
that I thought wanted to help me,
by people that I trusted.
[music fades]
[Matt] So we have filed a civil lawsuit
against Tiffany and against Hunter Hill.
And we've not sued Piper individually.
We have no claims against her.
And we're seeking collectively
in the tens of millions of dollars
for all 11 kids in this lawsuit.
[Taylor] In 2022, this lawsuit is filed,
alleging a lot of wrongdoing,
a lot of bad behavior,
and kind of pulling the curtain back
on a lot of really bad things that
were happening behind the scenes.
[tense, pulsing music playing]
[man] When I first started on this
case, I read the original complaint.
And the parents at that time were
mostly concerned about the effects
that they saw on these kids' careers.
And everything that was done
to these kids' YouTube accounts.
- [Sawyer] Okay, ready?
- [Corinne] Yeah.
[Jeremiah] We went in, and
we asked the kids questions.
And we discovered that the
stories that the parents had told us
about what was going on
were just the tip of an iceberg.
What we have is 11 kids
whose stories all line up.
[Claire] Oh.
And what they did to
these children is shocking.
[somber music playing]
- Oh my G [chuckles]
- [ball clatters]
[Jeremiah] After we filed the complaint,
um, we went through a
process that's called discovery.
And I know, for a lot of you, we're
meeting for the first time today.
In my understandings,
you're still learning more
about what the kids went
through that you didn't know.
It seemed like, originally, a
lot of you came to this case
because of the interference
with the YouTube channels.
And after the case started, as you
met with Matt and and our firm,
you discovered all these
other elements, um, to the story,
the emotional abuse they went through,
the verbal abuse they went through,
the sexual abuse they went through.
[somber music playing]
[Ashley] When I first heard from Claire
and Reese about what happened to them,
we had our first meeting
as a group with our lawyers.
And the lawyers started asking questions.
Sophie said something.
And then Claire's like, "Me too."
And then, um, Reese was like, "Me too."
And then Hayden was like,
"Well, she did this to me."
And then Sawyer says, "She did this."
And then everybody just
kind of started unloading.
[breathes deeply]
We were not prepared to
hear stories of the sexual stuff.
Now we're in a really dark area.
And it made me feel even
worse for letting her stay.
[Corinne] I can't really remember
what conversation led up to this,
but I remember Tiffany asking me, like,
"Corinne, like, have you
ever given a blow job?"
And I was just like, "What's that?"
When I was younger, like,
I didn't know what that was.
I was confused.
And then she was, like,
giggling and laughing.
And I looked at Hunter, and
Hunter was, like, laughing.
And then she was like,
"Oh, like, you can,
like, do it on Hunter."
Like, "I'll show you, like, with Hunter."
And then they were, like,
laughing, like, really hard.
And then Piper was like, "Oh,
like, Mom, stop. Like stop."
Like, Piper was saying stop.
I was 11.
It makes me feel sad for my younger self.
I feel like I could have easily been,
like, taken advantage
of in that situation,
which is really scary to me.
Tiffany would target us
when we were most vulnerable
and when we were alone.
And she had this character called Lenny.
[Tiffany] Lenny!
[Piper giggling]
[Sophie] Lenny was a cat that
belonged to Tiffany and Piper that died.
- [mouse clicks]
- Tiffany would have a voice.
And Lenny was basically the vent
for all of her dirty or
sexual, like, thoughts
that she could get
away "get away with."
Lenny is not a character featured
in Piper's videos or anything like that.
Lenny was just something
that was off-camera just to us.
[unsettling music playing]
Tiffany usually woke us up in the morning,
and it was usually something
that she did as Lenny.
There was one time she came up to
us, and at some point she got in the bed.
And then she was on top of
She would go for me and Piper,
and she was on top of us
on her hands and knees,
like, pinning us down,
saying that she was a mountain goat.
And then she was, like She would howl.
Uh, she did that spit thing
where you, like, take spit down
and then you, like, suck it back up.
She did that to me.
And I couldn't move. I couldn't, like I
didn't have any way to defend myself.
So I can't remember how I did it,
but somehow I got my arms out
to where I could cover the
blanket as soon as the spit fell.
So and then we just got up out of bed,
and then just acted
like it was any other day.
[Angela] As each of the kids
started telling what she did to them
and how it affected them,
the moms, we just all started crying.
The amount of stuff you're hearing,
and you're like, "How could this happen?"
[voice breaks] Like,
with Reese, in particular,
[sniffles] was so little. [sobs]
Like a baby. She was nine.
I don't really remember how it started,
but I remember I was
bringing something to her room.
I was like, "Here, Tiffany."
And I put it on her bed.
And then as I was walking
out, she said in Lenny's voice,
Tiffany said in Lenny's voice,
she said, "Wait, Reese, don't go."
And I was like, "I'm getting out of here."
Like, "I wanna leave. I wanna get out."
And she grabbed me.
I don't know by my waist or, like,
my legs or my throat or whatever.
I don't remember, but she grabbed me.
So I ran to her bathroom,
and I locked myself in there.
Um, and I was just sitting
there, and then she said,
Tiffany said in Lenny's voice,
"Reese, I have my pants down."
"Do you wanna come look?"
And I said, "No."
So, um, just in case she
did have her pants down,
I didn't wanna be traumatized,
so I put my hand over my eyes.
I unlocked the door
quietly. I opened it up quietly.
And I was kind of feeling around the room.
And then, whenever I
kind of knew where I was,
I opened up my eyes, and
I started to walk to the door.
And then she grabbed me
and pulled me on her bed.
Um
And she started She
was holding me down.
And she started to take her
hand and move it on my face,
my chest, like everywhere.
She started to, like,
move her hand around.
And I, um, took her arms off me, and
I broke free, and I unlocked the door,
and I ran out of there,
and I went to the RV.
I just stayed there for the rest
of the day until the next day.
I didn't really go out the next day.
[somber music playing]
[Ashley] By the time Reese was done,
we were all bawling.
The parents were bawling.
[voice breaks] I got physically
ill. I don't want to throw up.
I feel like I'm gonna throw up
right now talking about it. [sniffles]
Similar things happened
to Claire and Soph.
[Sophie] Tiffany would sexually assault
like, me, Claire, and Reese a lot.
There was this one
time, uh, I was asleep
[sniffles] and I woke up,
and she was, like, on
top of me when I woke up.
And, like, rubbing her hand all
over me, saying it was Lenny's dick.
And then finally, she let go,
and she had left the room.
But I remember being so scared.
And so I started locking my door.
But my door has, like, one of those slits,
so you could stick a penny in it
and you could turn it from the outside.
So I started locking my door.
And she would take a penny,
and she would still come in.
And it still affects me
to this day that, like
I don't know if I should say this, but
I sleep with, like, a knife by my bed
'cause, like, I'm so scared
of somebody breaking in
or coming in my room from that.
And there's so much more that went on
that, like, I don't think I really
wanna talk about on camera
'cause it's too much.
[somber music playing]
[Steevy] That was the first
time hearing what had happened
and the stories that had happened to them.
It's really hard to hear this.
Their innocence is now gone.
It made me feel like I didn't protect her.
[voice breaks] I was
traumatized. Like, poor kids.
- [sniffles]
- [music fades]
Mm because we were we're their moms,
and we're supposed to
protect them, and we didn't.
[sniffles]
We couldn't. We didn't know.
[Sophie] My mom didn't know
anything about the sexual things
Tiffany was trying to do
towards me or any of that.
I think I was just
embarrassed at all the stuff,
that I didn't tell my mom.
And I really wish I would have sooner.
None of us did.
Claire didn't tell her mom.
Reese didn't tell her mom.
Like, nobody said anything.
[Claire] I would sometimes think maybe
I should tell my moms what happened.
But whenever Tiffany started
doing the things to me and Reese,
we saw her do it to Piper as well.
Piper thinks it's completely normal.
So we're like, "Okay, you
know, she's doing this to you."
"I guess it's fine that
she does this to us too."
I didn't realize anything was wrong,
and I was just justifying in my head,
"Oh, this is family.
It's fine. It's okay."
I think that's one of her main advantages,
that she was family, she was my aunt.
And it was Lenny. It wasn't Tiffany.
It was Lenny who was doing it.
[Sarah] Tiffany here is
the mom and manager
of one of the largest child
minor accounts on social media
and has been called out quite a
few times for her questionable content.
My name is Sarah Adams.
I go by mom.uncharted on social media.
And I built a platform around
exploring kidfluencers and parents
who, in my opinion,
exploit their children online.
Late 2021 was when I
learned about Piper Rockelle.
And then the lawsuit dropped.
And that's when I started just
paying a little more attention
to what was happening.
[plinking]
[chimes]
Many are aware of the
lawsuit against Tiffany Smith.
It has been filed by 11
former Squad members,
kids who used to work
with Piper, against Tiffany.
And there are many allegations.
[intriguing music playing]
[man 1] Today's video
is about Piper Rockelle
and the absolutely insane lawsuit.
147 pages of absolute madness.
[man 2] The kids accused Tiffany
of physical, emotional, verbal,
and S abuse,
as well as financial exploitation.
Some of the allegations are insane.
A few months before the lawsuit
was filed, singer Pink tweeted out,
"How many kids like Piper Rockelle
are being exploited by their parents?"
"At what point do the rest of us say,
'This isn't okay for a
13-year-old to be in a bikini
whilst her mother takes the photo'?"
Piper's mother, Tiffany, is accused
of doing some revolting things.
Encouraging teens to have oral sex,
dress sluttier, and touching
children inappropriately.
All of our innocence
was just swiped from us.
We didn't know a lot of the
things that were going on.
We weren't allowed to be there.
If you put your kids in these squads,
you're to blame too.
I don't care if you knew or didn't know.
You still put your kids in this situation.
I can't.
[Taylor] We start to see cracks
emerging and and red flags, basically,
with The Squad quite early on.
And I think the parents
kind of ignore those red flags.
They kind of sweep it under
the rug. They minimize it.
And they ultimately become complicit
in their own child's exploitation.
If I were watching this
show, I'd be like, "Idiots."
I already know what I would say.
"Why the hell would
you stay around for that?"
I already know what I would say, 100%.
I would not understand why anyone
kept their kid in that environment.
But it's so complex.
[tense music playing]
There's manipulation
at the level of the kids.
There's manipulation at
the level of the parents.
She was watching us like hawks.
We weren't allowed to
hang out with other people.
We weren't allowed to talk to
anyone who had left The Squad.
By the time you
realize that it's not good,
you're also scared to leave
or scared to say anything.
It's like a like a cult or
something. Like, you can't get out.
Like, once you're in,
you know all the consequences
of even just crossing her.
Your kid's gonna be tanked.
There's gonna be hate content.
There's going to be all kinds of hell.
[camera clicks]
You don't want to hurt your kid.
And then your child
doesn't wanna tell you stuff.
Sawyer didn't want to tell me.
He didn't want me to be upset
about something that happened to him
and do something because he knew
the consequences of upsetting her.
[Jeremiah] The bottom line is this. The
parents didn't know what was going on.
You might be able to fault them for that,
for not knowing what was
happening to their children at the time.
That doesn't excuse the defendants
from what they did to these children.
This case is not about the parents.
[exhales deeply]
After the lawsuit became public,
I had a lot of people
who were coming after me
because they were saying that I was lying,
or they were saying that I
shouldn't have left my family.
There was a a lot of
hate towards everybody in it.
And I think so many people,
instead of trying to hear it out,
just automatically thought
that we were faking it.
- [keyboard clacking]
- [tense music playing]
[Sawyer] It definitely sucked. It did.
'Cause it was it was
a lot for me to deal with,
not only with the hate comments,
but just being like,
"I wonder what's gonna happen. I
wonder what people are gonna think."
[keyboard clacking]
[Steevy] Everybody says we're lying.
Social media people say we're lying.
We just want money.
And I mean, honestly, for Corinne,
she doesn't care about the money.
She's been silenced for so long.
She's just like, "I'm not lying."
"This happened to me, and I want
everybody to know that this can happen."
I feel like I'm ready to mm, face her,
like, and show her that
we're stronger than she thinks.
And we're warning people
so they don't have to
go through what we did.
[Claire] Yeah.
I feel like we're giving
so many people voices,
especially in this industry,
because the things that
happen behind the scenes
are never, you know, seen by anybody.
[Taylor] These abuse
allegations against Tiffany,
which include battery
and child labor violations,
are not unique to the
Piper Rockelle, Tiffany case.
[tense music continues]
These are common forms of abuse
that are rampant in
the kidfluencer industry.
[reporter] A popular YouTube mom,
known for her strict parenting style,
now under suspicion of child abuse.
Kidfluencing right now
is the Wild Wild West.
I mean, there's no regulations
that keep these influencers safe.
[Jeremiah] It's an unregulated
frontier of the entertainment industry.
And that's why we have
this lawsuit, which is really
It should be the last line of
defense to have to do a civil lawsuit.
When a child's treated like this,
they shouldn't have to go
out and hire private attorneys
in order to vindicate their rights.
[woman] Mr. Hill, would
you raise your right hand?
You do solemnly swear or affirm
the evidence you're about to give
will be the truth, the whole
truth, and nothing but the truth.
Yes.
[tense music continues]
[Sophie] Hunter was a
very interesting character
because I always looked at Hunter
as this person who had my back,
who was just a victim of Tiffany,
and who didn't understand
right from wrong.
So I used to sympathize for Hunter.
[man] Has Tiffany ever engaged in
any kind of verbal abuse against you?
No.
[man] Never?
No. I I mean, we're in
a relationship. We argue.
[Sawyer] Hunter seems like
a good guy on the surface.
He seems like someone that just
wants to help these kids be successful.
But I think he's really just a weak
man that's being controlled by Tiffany.
I think working with
Tiffany is phenomenal.
She's probably the best
boss, partner, coach, teammate
I've ever worked with, ever.
[Sophie] I feel at 20-something,
you should be able
to stick up for yourself
and stick up for these 12-year-olds
who are supposedly your "best friends."
[Hunter] All right, here we
go. Three, two, one, action.
[Sophie] Hunter was
definitely Tiffany's sidekick.
[Hunter] Tiff, how do
you want 'em to say it?
[Sophie] So I think, like,
obviously, for the sake of YouTube,
he wanted us to get
close and, like, vulnerable,
and he could get these things on camera.
He could use it to his advantage.
So now, like, I have no sympathy for him.
I just think he was a weirdo
who hung out with 12-year-olds.
[man exhaling, clicking tongue]
[man] How's it going, Hunter?
We're just doing our job out here.
We're investigating a
story about the lawsuit.
Um, I understand. Do you understand
that you can't have a minor on camera?
[man] Well, that's public
property. That's public.
No, you need to have a film permit
- [man] No, you don't.
- to film minors. You do.
[traffic whirring]
[man] There's 11 minors that
claim you sexually assaulted them.
[Ashley] I remember
when the lawsuit came out.
We weren't the only
ones that got a lot of heat.
Tiffany got a lot of criticism too.
And I do remember Piper putting out
a video that came to her mom's rescue.
If my mom did not help me and
help me make my dreams come true,
I would not be here for you guys.
Like, I thank my mom every day,
and I tell her how grateful I am for her.
[voice breaks] Because she's so strong.
I don't even know if I would be able
to go through what she's gone through
or going through still. [sobs]
[somber music playing]
I first met Piper and Tiffany in 2021.
My friend brought me there
because they were, uh,
having some cats for adoption.
And I, you know, love cats.
From there, I saw them,
like, maybe once a month.
Some months, it was
like three times a month.
I would do TikToks.
I would just kind of, like, lounge
there and, like, talk to them.
When I first met Piper, she
was happy with her friends.
It was, like, a fun environment.
Then, at the end, it was
like she was depressed.
She, I know, was
starting to not eat a lot.
And she was just kind
of wanting to be isolated.
[female reporter] Today,
Piper's mom, Tiffany Smith,
is under fire by all these
former Squad members.
After the lawsuit was filed,
Tiffany would tell Piper that
these were just mean, evil people
wanting her money and
wanting to ruin her reputation,
and that they never really liked her.
And Piper, I think, definitely
seemed to believe that.
And Piper would now share that
with people if asked about the lawsuit.
It's like, whatever Tiffany said,
Piper engraved into her brain,
and that's all she can think of now.
It's like she's programmed that way now.
I mean, honestly, I feel it's my fault.
Because if I didn't hang
out with these people
that did something so terrible to me,
I feel like this wouldn't
be happening to my family.
[Matt] After we filed
our lawsuit in early 2022,
YouTube demonetized Piper's account.
Basically, she could still post but
wouldn't be able to make money for it.
So her revenue from YouTube went
from 500,000, 600,000 a month to zero.
Uh, YouTube has said it has
to do with content guidelines
and violations of terms of service.
We have a a creator
responsibility guidelines, uh, policy,
where if creators have
off-platform behavior
or there's off-platform
news that could be damaging
to the broader creator ecosystem,
you can be suspended from
our monetization program.
[Taylor] Demonetization is
basically like a big punishment.
YouTube has only done this for really
the most controversial content creators.
[tense music playing]
Here's the problem with these platforms.
It's really not until the media
draws attention to something
that they take action.
After this lawsuit files,
things begin to crumble.
Major brand deals start falling
apart. Brands are pulling out.
People don't wanna work
with any content creator
that's at the center of
a controversial scandal.
[Sarah] Due to the lawsuit,
they have had to diversify.
She has been looking for other avenues.
And when I say "she," Tiffany,
has been looking for other avenues
to monetize her child.
[Taylor] She retreats onto these
other platforms like Snapchat.
Snapchat is a platform very
different than other social media apps
because there's no comment section.
So they can just post, monetize,
and sort of stay under the radar.
I'm also aware that Piper is on
another website called BrandArmy.
And BrandArmy is often
compared to OnlyFans,
but it doesn't do nudity.
On BrandArmy, you can be as young
as 13 to actually create content on there.
But in order for people to
subscribe to that content,
they have to be at least 18.
[Sarah] Meaning, BrandArmy is a website
that is allowing adults to subscribe
to exclusive content of minors.
I don't know how a website justifies this.
I don't know how it is legal.
But, like, this is a thing
in the digital world today.
And honestly, it just makes
me feel sick to my stomach.
[tense music continues]
[Katherine] A lot of young
influencers have recognized
that there is actually a
market to sell extra content.
Meta did its own investigation
into this phenomenon
and determined that a lot of
the users who are willing to pay
for this extra child-focused material
were users that had indicated,
through their interactions
on the platforms,
they were likely sexually
interested in children.
[Sarah] Predators can take advantage
of these kids in so many ways.
There have been stories of cyberstalking.
There have been stories
of physical stalking.
And a lot of scary things are happening.
[Karen] I'm not sure
which is more damaging.
The fact that there are anonymous
adults following these children,
or the fact that at some pretty early
age, the kids know that that's the fact.
And then they continue
to act provocatively
because they know that
the provocative actions
will draw in more likes, more
comments, and more monetization.
[Ava] Seeing kids get on these platforms
and being allowed on platforms
that they really shouldn't be
just to exploit them
and see photos of them
that you shouldn't see of
a child is extremely wrong
and something that should
not even be available to them
as they are not developed
enough to make these decisions.
I gotta get all of these
kiss marks off of me,
so let's get them off.
[Claire] My heart hurts for Piper,
seeing her on something like that.
And who knows if she even
has a decision in being on it.
The Piper that I knew,
that is absolutely not
what she wants to do.
I'm kind of, like, concerned a little bit.
Seeing the content now,
like Piper in bathing suits.
I feel like I kinda wish I
knew what was going on.
I noticed that Piper was
always worried about money.
And she herself was worried
that they had to pay their mortgage
and they had to pay $20,000
in cat food for their 70 cats.
So it definitely just seemed
like it was Piper's responsibility
to hold that house up.
She started doing more
provocative dances, it seemed like,
wearing provocative
clothing and just acting older,
not really seeming to appear
that she is 15 or 16 at the time.
I know, a lot of the times, they would
be doing, like, a regular photo shoot,
and then they would have a specific outfit
from a brand they need to do
for for their BrandArmy page.
And one time she told her,
"Come on, Piper. You need
to get BrandArmy mode on."
And then Piper kind of, like,
bent over and put her butt out
and, like, started touching her body
in a very, like, sexual, disturbing way.
[haunting, poignant music playing]
[Steevy] Where's the line for Tiffany?
The fact that she's got
her child on a platform
where she's walking around
and dancing around in
a bikini for subscribers?
It doesn't stop.
It's still not stopping today.
The fact that Tiffany's still
operating, it boggles my mind.
And it boggles my mind
because shortly after the lawsuit,
we were contacted by the FBI.
[somber, intriguing music playing]
They said, "We want
to talk to your girls."
There have been FBI visits with, I
think, every kid who's in this lawsuit.
They have our entire file.
They have all the stories.
There's police reports in
multiple districts around LA.
But we're not really getting any answers.
The information that I
received from the FBI agent
was they won't try a case
unless they know they have a smoking gun
and they know that they'll win the case.
So I don't I don't know.
That's that's the last I
heard from the FBI agent,
and that's the last I
heard from the detective.
[tense, intriguing music playing]
[Taylor] The government
has absolutely no appetite
to implement any sort of meaningful
regulations on this industry.
They still treat this industry as a joke.
Lawmakers are often 70 to 80 years old.
They don't take this
world seriously at all.
They make fun of it. They mock it.
Mr. Zuckerberg, you have
convinced over two billion people
to give up all of their
personal information
in exchange for getting to see
what their high school friends
had for dinner Saturday night.
That's pretty much your
business model, isn't it?
[Zuckerberg smacks lips] That's
not how I would characterize it.
[Taylor] For them to try
to regulate the industry,
it's like a chimpanzee trying
to solve a Rubik's Cube.
I mean, frankly, that's
probably more likely.
And until we start taking
this industry seriously,
until we start viewing
influencing as labor,
these kids are screwed.
Welcome back to my channel.
Today's video is going
to be another prank video!
[music rises, abates]
- [music fades]
- [keyboard clacking]
My name is Chris McCarty,
and I am the founder
and executive director
of Quit Clicking Kids.
I'm working to protect child influencers,
pushing legislation forward
to make sure that we can
better protect children online.
- [keyboard clacking]
- [intriguing music playing]
I started doing this project in
my senior year of high school.
There were a couple of news
stories that made me think about,
what is really happening
with child influencing?
There's so many different layers.
I think one of the biggest
misconceptions is not seeing it as work,
especially for the kids.
It is very much not a hobby
for many of these influencers.
It is a job.
And in some cases, it's the primary
or even the only source of income
for these families.
That has the potential to place
an undue burden on these children
to create content.
It can become a huge pressure as a kid
to know that you're the one
making the family money.
And I think it can get
very muddy and messy
when there is so much money
involved, there's fame involved.
It can create some really hard dynamics.
[Sarah] I can't imagine how that feels
for a child to be the essential,
like, cash cow of their family.
And as it relates to Piper,
she has been the one
generating income for her family
for all of these years.
And one might argue, Tiffany might
argue, that, well, she was the momager,
and she's entitled to something.
But that doesn't negate the fact
that all of that something is
based on exploiting your daughter.
[girl] Are you nervous to perform?
Me, right now, I'm actually
not nervous. I'm trying to stay
[Chris] In a lot of states, there
are things called Coogan laws,
which are protections for child actors.
These require parents to put aside
a percentage of the child's earnings
in escrow for them.
So part of the work that I'm trying to do
with Quit Clicking Kids is to make sure
that child influencers have those
same protections as child actors.
[keyboard clacking]
Laws right now in America
are starting to catch up.
[reporter 1] Illinois is the
first state in the country
to ensure children featured in
social media videos with their families
are compensated for their work.
[Chris] California, right
now, does have legislation
similar to what was
introduced in Illinois.
[reporter 2] Today, the
governor signed two laws
ensuring child influencers
aren't taken advantage of
next to former child star
and singer Demi Lovato.
[Chris] It is giving me hope
that a state like California,
who does have a relatively high
population of child influencers,
is starting to make those
first steps towards change.
I hope that that starts the ball rolling,
not only for financial compensation,
but also in terms of set
teachers, regulated work hours,
and checking and making sure
that these families are
following best practices
and protecting their children.
[somber, intriguing music playing]
[man] It's a start.
Does it do anything? Not really.
You still can exploit them, just have
to pay them for it now. Well, thanks.
[overlapping clamoring]
[Karen] I wish there were a way
to regulate the social media world
for children.
I don't know how you could ever do it.
And I would love to be wrong,
but I don't know how you
figure out a way to regulate
or to send a monitor into
somebody's backyard or living room
while the mom and dad are
shooting pictures of the kid.
I flat-out don't think it's possible.
[tinkling, blooping]
[Taylor] We've allowed these platforms
to scale completely unchecked for so long,
it feels like trying to put
a genie back in the bottle.
But there are things we can do.
We really just need to educate people.
We need to change culture. We
need to change norms around parenting.
Honestly, like, you want to
know where the responsibility lies?
Parents should not allow
children to be put in a position
where they can be exploited or harmed.
And when it comes to, like,
kids displaying their personal lives
for any audience,
you know, people should
be asking themselves,
"Is it really okay for
my child's vulnerabilities
to be displayed to random strangers?"
Would I recommend it to my
children or my grandchildren?
Probably not.
But do I think that there's a safe way
we can approach curating
a process that's much safer?
Absolutely.
[overlapping clamoring]
[Taylor] The fundamental problem is
the business model of these platforms
and these capitalist incentives.
[Jeremiah] What Tiffany and
Hunter were generating in revenue
is hundreds of thousands
of dollars a month.
And that's a huge incentive
for them to do the types of things
that they were doing
here with these children.
[Hunter] So, okay,
Sawyer, hands on her hips.
- My hips.
- This feels weird.
[Hunter] Okay, Piper, around Okay.
And again, you guys are making out, so
[Jeremiah] I hope that
the public will understand
that they shouldn't just
consume this kind of content
without recognizing the harm
that it's causing to the people
who are being used
in creating the content.
[intriguing music continues]
[Chris] Really what gives these
accounts their fuel and their drive
is the people who subscribe,
the people who follow,
the people who are buying
any of the sponsored
products from these accounts.
So as much as we can, taking
attention away from those accounts,
I think, in a way, disincentivizes
parents to be putting their kids out there
for content in that way.
[overlapping clamoring]
I hope that people stop
consuming this content.
[girls] Whoo! Make
sure you like, subscribe
and turn on those post notifications.
[Claire squeals, giggles]
[Hunter] Whoo!
[Claire] I have a kind of resentment
towards YouTube and social media today.
And I think that my passion for it
has definitely died down.
I took a mental break from YouTube.
It was just really kind of degrading.
And it's hard to keep
trying to be motivated
whenever you're getting bad comments.
[somber music playing]
[music fades]
So we've been presented
with a settlement offer. Um
I I brought the settlement,
uh, conversation to Claire.
She was, um, not exactly happy.
But the reason why she wasn't happy
was because she wanted to get on the stand
and tell everyone in the
court and the judge and the jury
what happened to her.
She feels like Tiffany is
still getting away with things.
And I can't help but
kind of agree with that.
We all said, "We just
wanted it out there."
"We just wanted people to know
what happens, what can happen."
You know, we're getting the word out.
And people are gonna know
what happened to all of us.
And that was our goal.
[tense, pensive music playing]
[Ashley] We may be done with the lawsuit,
but what we're not done
with is sharing our experience.
And I hope that we can prevent
other kids going through the
situation that our kids went through.
[music continues]
[Johna] They took every
opportunity away from me
to be involved in my son's life.
But yet Tiffany still has her daughter.
She's the one accused
of all of these abuses,
but she still has her daughter,
and my son got ripped from me.
In many ways, a lawsuit
is where justice goes to die.
[Ashley] Tiffany is still very
free to make the content
that she's been making.
She's got new kids coming,
and she's got a new squad now.
[Steevy] She's gonna keep finding people.
There's always the
next person ready to go.
It's still happening. It's still going on.
You'd think a lawsuit
would make her stop. It's not.
[Amber] This is not just these 11 kids.
There's so many others.
So many others.
And if something isn't done,
these won't be the last kids either.
[tense music continues]
[music fades]
[Claire laughs]
[Matt] There's a victim in all of this
who isn't represented at this table
and may not know she's a victim.
- [Ashley] Mm-hmm.
- And that's Piper.
- [Ashley] Absolutely.
- Piper has no voice in this.
- [Ashley] Yeah.
- [Amber] Yeah.
[Matt] She's not here.
She's been very restricted in what she
can do and who she can interact with.
- The first victim here is Piper.
- [Angela] Mm-hmm.
[Steevy] I mean, from pageant days,
and, you know, those early days
when Corinne was filming with her,
uh, she was just a little girl.
- [Tiffany] Corinne! Yeehaw, girl!
- [poignant music playing]
Piper!
Yeehaw, girl!
[Tiffany] All right! Woo-hoo!
[Sarah] I think in her earlier
videos, when she was younger,
there was a little bit of light.
I think it was exciting and fun.
And I look at the videos
over the past year,
and it doesn't look exciting.
It doesn't look fun.
She doesn't look happy.
And it's worrisome.
I'm trying not to laugh here,
okay? [chuckles awkwardly]
- [Hunter] Keep going. Come on.
- And now--
[Hunter] "We're gonna show you
game mode." That's all you fucking say.
[Karen] Imagine a world where
every time you do anything,
tens of thousands of people
can comment and criticize you.
You never have the freedom to
try things out and make mistakes.
And what people don't remember
is that that is a real
child with real emotions
who is now being devastated
by the negative public attention.
You have to worry
about that kid's well-being
and about that kid's ability to
figure out who they are in the world.
["Liar" by Tiny Deaths playing]
I don't want to be another ♪
Liar ♪
I don't want to sink ♪
Into the sand ♪
[Tiffany] Go ahead. Then
maybe blow the camera a kiss.
[smooches]
[smooches]
[poignant music continues]
[Sophie] I genuinely hope
that Piper is able to realize
what she's in and get out.
She doesn't even realize it now.
- [Claire] I know.
- She thinks that's normal. So--
[Claire] And that's so sad.
Her mom is in her ear all the time.
And if she's watching this right now
- Hey! It's not normal.
- [Sophie] Yeah.
Go go be somewhere where
it's not connected to a Hunter,
it's not connected to a Tiffany.
'Cause I feel like when we all
left, we wanted Piper to get out.
But I feel like we all
had to do this thing
where it was like we
needed to save ourselves.
Even if we didn't necessarily want to
'cause we felt bad leaving
somebody stranded.
[music continues]
[Claire] It was extremely
hard for me to leave Piper
because I didn't want her to
feel like I was abandoning her.
[chuckles] I'm trying not to cry.
Huh!
Okay.
[music continues]
[voice breaks] It was really hard,
especially having somebody
my age who's in my family
and I can connect
with and be friends with.
It was just really hard to leave her.
And I still feel bad about it. So
[sobs]
Huh.
[music abates]
I just want her to know
that it's not her fault.
I don't want her to
blame herself for anything.
And I still love her, and I
still care about her very much.
[music builds]
Ooh ♪
- Another liar ♪
- [indistinct chatter, giggling]
- [Claire] Oh.
- Go, go, go.
- [Reese] Bring it back.
- It's starting.
- Another liar ♪
- [Corinne] Three, two, one.
Please don't leave me alone ♪
[Corinne] All of us are here
for her, and we would help her.
There's so much better that she deserves.
Piper is a super sweet girl.
And she deserves good friends
and a good environment to be around.
Ooh ♪
- Another liar ♪
- [Claire giggles]
- Don't leave me alone ♪
- Leave me alone ♪
[music continues]
[Claire blows raspberry, laughs]
[laughter echoes]
- [ping]
- [music fades]
[tense, pulsing music playing]
[music fades]
[poignant piano music playing]
[music fades]