What Was Hiding Behind Snapchat's Ghost.

“Users who have the Snapchat addiction have no room for anything else. Snap dominates their life.” [1]

— Snapchat executive, internal company documents, obtained through school districts lawsuit, reported by CNN, November 2025

This quote came from a Snapchat executive. And the only reason it came to light was because of a lawsuit. If not for the lawsuit, these comments would have remained in the darkness, never revealing the company for who they really are.

They knew exactly what they had built. The question is what else were they hiding behind that ghost. I’ll warn you now, it’s not a friendly ghost.

The Disappearing Act

When Snapchat launched in 2011 the disappearing messages feature felt like something different. Send something and it vanishes. No permanent record, you could send a picture and the evidence was gone the moment they closed it. Teenagers loved it. Problem was, drug dealers loved it for exactly the same reason.

Fentanyl dealers figured out almost immediately that Snapchat was the perfect place to run their business. All forensics vanished within 24 hours. No breadcrumbs for law enforcement to follow. No evidence for prosecutors to use. A court filing from the ongoing lawsuits quotes an internal Snap employee noting that it takes under a minute to use Snapchat to purchase illegal and harmful substances. [2]

The lawsuit against Snap alleges Snapchat is the go to means to distribute drugs to children teens and young adults through social media. [3] Fentanyl is the number one killer of teenagers under 18 in America. And Snapchat handed the dealers the perfect tool to reach them. Sadly it didn’t just work, it worked really well.

They Had Names

Behind the lawsuits and the statistics are real people with names.

Alexander Neville was 14 years old. He was preparing for his freshman year of high school when he died in 2020 after taking a fentanyl laced pill from a dealer he found on Snapchat. [4]

Sammy Chapman was 16 years old. He died in 2021. His parents Laura Berman and Sam Chapman later stood before Congress and testified about what happened to their son. [4]

They are two of 63 families who have filed lawsuits against Snap. All victims were between 14 and 22 years old. Only 2 survived. [5]

Fentanyl related teen deaths increased 350 percent over three years. Law enforcement and court filings point to Snapchat as the primary platform dealers used to reach teenagers. [5] These are children who woke up one morning and never came home. Snapchat executives handled it poorly. To put it mildly.

They Even Ignored A Search Warrant

In 2021 Snap executives met with the parents of children who had died from fentanyl purchased through Snapchat. At first executives claimed they were unaware children purchase drugs on the platform. Then they told the grieving parents they should have monitored their children better. [6]

That meeting happened in front of witnesses and was later testified to before the United States Senate Judiciary Committee.

In October 2024 detectives in Thurston County Washington became aware of a suspect selling drugs to middle school and high school students on Snapchat. They secured a search warrant and delivered it to Snap. Despite receiving the warrant Snap allowed the account to continue operating using the same account. Two months later a 16 year old boy purchased what he believed to be MDMA from that same dealer and died. [6] Snap chose not to act and a child died because of it.

Senator Chuck Grassley wrote directly to Snap in April 2025 questioning what he called the sincerity of Snap’s efforts to end fentanyl sales on its platform. [6]

They were warned more than once and from more than one direction. And yet here we are.

75 Complaints. Still Active.

The fentanyl deaths are not the only thing Snapchat’s ghost was hiding. Because while teenagers were dying from drugs purchased on the platform something else was happening in the shadows at the same time.

Internal Snap documents show the company received 10,000 reports of sextortion every single month in 2022. Employees acknowledged internally that these reports were likely only a fraction of the total abuse occurring on the platform. [7]

One account had 75 different complaints against it. The complaints specifically referenced nudes, minors, and extortion. The account remained active. [7]

By design over 90 percent of account level reports were ignored. These were not accusations from outside the company. That is a direct quote from an internal Snap employee Slack chat. [7]

Of confirmed sextortion cases involving 279 victims 70 percent never reported because they knew no action would be taken. Of the 30 percent who did report there was no enforcement action taken by Snap. [7]

And then there is this. Snap did not keep its database of child sexual abuse images current. When the failure was identified and the database was updated employees were directed to roll back the change and delete the evidence of matches. [7]

So the way they went about it was a simple cover up method. Sounds about right.

Casualties And Pawns

In January 2024 every major social media CEO was called before the United States Senate Judiciary Committee. Snap CEO Evan Spiegel sat at the table alongside Mark Zuckerberg and the CEOs of TikTok, X, and Discord. The room was filled with parents who had lost children.

Spiegel stood and apologized.

Bridgette Norring was in that room. Her son had died from a fentanyl overdose after ordering a pill from a dealer on Snapchat. She called the apology fake. She told CNN it lacked any heart. “I just feel like for them, our children are just casualties, pawns in this game to make money.” [8]

63 families have filed fentanyl specific lawsuits against Snap. State lawsuits have been brought by New Mexico, Utah, Florida, and Texas. The FBI is examining Snapchat’s role in fentanyl poisoning deaths. And a California judge ruled that parents can hold Snap legally accountable for facilitating drug sales marking the first time a court allowed parents to hold a social media company accountable for facilitating the sale of deadly drugs. [5]

Casualties and pawns. Incredible imagery from a mother who lost her son.

Make The Ghost Disappear For Good

Snapchat built the perfect platform for dealers to push drugs. The platform that made the evidence disappear all by design. What did not disappear were the real world consequences. There are 63 families who will wake up every morning the rest of their life without their children. A message needs to be sent to these platforms that continually choose profits over the safety of their own users.

We have seen enough.

The ghost was never friendly. It was a logo hiding the truth.

Make it disappear for good. See you out there at disconnectd.com.

How To Delete Your Snapchat Account

Important note: Snapchat does not allow account deletion from within the mobile app. You must use a web browser on your phone or desktop to complete the process.

Before you delete make sure to download your data first. You may have photos, memories, and messages stored on the platform that you will want to keep.

To download your data: Open Snapchat and tap your profile icon in the top left. Tap the settings gear in the top right. Scroll to Account Actions then tap My Data. Enter your password and follow the prompts. Snapchat will email you a link to download your data.

To delete your account on any device: Open a browser on your phone or computer and go to accounts.snapchat.com. Log in with your username and password. Click or tap Delete My Account. Read through the information Snapchat provides about what deletion means. Re-enter your username and password to confirm. Click or tap Continue to submit your deletion request.

The 30 day grace period: After confirming deletion Snapchat deactivates your account immediately. Your profile becomes invisible to other users. If you log back in at any point during the 30 day period the deletion is cancelled and your account is fully restored. After 30 days without logging in your account and all associated data are permanently deleted with no possibility of recovery.

The ghost is gone. And this time it is not coming back.

Sources

[1] Lawsuit alleges social media giants buried their own research on teen mental health harms. CNN / KRDO. November 2025. krdo.com

[2] Online Drug Markets and Lawsuits Against Snapchat. Legislative Analysis Organization. July 2025. legislativeanalysis.org

[3] Relatives of more than 60 young people who died of fentanyl overdoses file expanded lawsuit against Snapchat. NBC News. April 2023. nbcnews.com

[4] Families lawsuit against Snapchat alleging the platform enables drug dealers allowed to move forward. ABC News. January 2024. abcnews.go.com

[5] Snapchat Fentanyl Lawsuit 2026 Update. Social Media Victims Law Center. socialmediavictims.org

[6] Grassley Calls Out Snapchat’s Failure to Stop Deadly Drug Sales. United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary. April 2025. judiciary.senate.gov

[7] Attorney General Raúl Torrez Files Unredacted Complaint Against Snapchat. New Mexico Department of Justice. October 2024. nmdoj.gov

[8] CEOs of Meta, X, Discord, TikTok and Snap testify before Senate Judiciary Committee. CNN. January 31, 2024. cnn.com