Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier is suing Discord, the communications platform with a large gaming community, for allegedly failing to properly check users' ages for years, and not scanning their private messages and other content thoroughly enough.
We obtained a copy of the complaint for you here.
In September, Discord rolled out an age verification system, but the attorney general's office says this is "too little, too late," and is now asking the court to make sure the company is forced to make more changes.
The lawsuit, filed in state circuit court in Glades County, comes almost seven months after Uthmeier opened an investigation and subpoenaed the company on March 18, 2026.
The complaint says of Discord's recent announcement: "That late-breaking and insufficient announcement cannot undo the harm already caused in violation of Florida law; nor will it fully remedy the problem going forward."
Discord said it would stop children from unblurring sensitive images and videos unless they could verify that they are adults. But the complaint's objection is that this does not go far enough, because the filters "apply only to images and videos. They do not scan text messages, voice, or calls."
The complaint quotes Discord's own policy back at it: Discord monitors "all spaces for high harm content like malware and child sexual abuse material," but does "not scan all content in smaller spaces such as direct messages (DM), group chats, and small/non-community servers."
The state says Discord "fails to monitor private spaces on its platform for nefarious activities and instead relies on users to report inappropriate content and conduct." It also says: "Child predators are keenly aware that Discord does not monitor private spaces."
The legal hook is the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act (FDUTPA). The alleged deception: "deceptively representing that Discord scans for inappropriate and explicit content knowing that it does not scan all spaces on its platform." The same gap is the basis for the second count: negligence.
Among the unfair practices the complaint lists: "Endangering children by including features like voice and video channels on its platform."
In September, Discord explained how it sorts accounts by age: "we don't look at your messages, calls, or other content." But Florida's grievance is that Discord does not surveil enough.
The complaint says Discord "could easily limit children's exposure to adults and predators by requiring a user to verify his or her age to increase the level of visibility or activity sharing on the platform."
It says Discord was deceptive in "representing that children under the age of 13 are not allowed on Discord's platform while failing to apply age verification measures to stop age falsification," and calls running the platform "without requiring age verification" unfair and unconscionable.
At a press conference in Tampa, Uthmeier said, "Discord told parents not to worry." Then: "But what the records and cases show is that Discord has not had real age verification." And, "We're asking the court for real protections, programmatic changes to ensure real age verification."
Discord's September system introduced three groups per account: adult, teen, unconfirmed. Discord said, "more than 90% of you won't be asked to confirm your age."
The September 22 announcement was preceded by a security breach in the same month last year, where data from a third-party support vendor was compromised, including the data of 70,000+ government IDs that were used to appeal age verification decisions.
The attorney general also wants the court to impose civil penalties of up to $10,000 per willful violation of FDUTPA, and up to $50,000 for each violation of the state's law on children in online spaces.
Discord should also be made to pay up to $150,000 for each violation of the state's online child safety law if the company knew that the child was under 18.
The filing also seeks disgorgement of all money and property that Discord has taken from Florida consumers.
What Florida wants from the court is a permanent injunction that would bar Discord from continuing the practices outlined in the complaint, including "operating without real age verification and collecting children's data without parental consent."
None of the allegations have been proven in court.
Other US states that have sued Discord are Texas, which wants every user to undergo age verification, as well as Nevada, Indiana, and New Jersey.
In addition, Brazil is seeking $97 million from Discord and wants it to expand age verification.
This is not the first time that a company is being rewarded for implementing age checks under regulator pressure, only to be asked to do more. And the more in this case is to scan not only images and videos, but also text messages, voice, and calls.
The push for more ID checks, and more reading of private messages, is sold as a way to make Discord a safer platform, but in reality, it would mean the end of private conversation on the platform.
