Connecticut Attorney General William Tong sent a letter to Sephora regarding the marketing of anti-aging skincare products with harmful ingredients like retinol and acids to children and teens on social media. The AG seeks information on product placements in searches for kids and warning practices, cautioning parents about potential skin harm from these products.
In-house legal teams should review all agreements governing marketing, sales, and platform operations, including influencer marketing agreements, website terms of use, vendor agreements with brands (e.g., Drunk Elephant, Glow Recipe), and any data processing agreements if customer data is involved. Specific clauses to scrutinize are those related to marketing compliance, target audience restrictions, age-gating mechanisms, product warning and disclaimer obligations, and control over search result algorithms and product placements. Given the AG's concern over products appearing in searches for 'kids' and 'gifts for children,' contracts may need amendments to mandate stricter age verification, require prominent warnings about ingredients like retinol and acids for young users, restrict product categorization and search indexing for minor audiences, and impose obligations on influencers to include safety disclaimers when promoting such products to younger demographics.
Entity
Sephora
Industry
RetailOfficial Press Release
https://portal.ct.gov/ag/press-releases/2024-press-releases/attorney-general-tong-cautions-parents-regarding-anti-aging-skincare
sephora usa inc inquiry letter112524.pdf?rev=00d5d4e2d528481
https://portal.ct.gov/-/media/ag/press_releases/2024/sephora-usa-inc-inquiry-letter112524.pdf?rev=00d5d4e2d5284811b6cb15fb6f77f3bb&hash=588DD9C5BED120D3E887339C75E9F0C2
Connecticut Attorney General Enforcement Page
https://portal.ct.gov/AG/Privacy/Privacy-Resources
Connecticut Attorney General William Tong announced a settlement with beauty retailer Sephora resolving an investigation into the company’s marketing of anti-aging skincare products containing active ingredients like retinol to children under 13. Sephora agreed to adopt enforceable safeguards including requiring suppliers to provide age suitability warnings, disclosing those warnings on product pages, training employees to advise young customers, and maintaining a public resource on age-appropriate products. No monetary penalty was imposed.
Connecticut Attorney General William Tong announced a civil investigative demand into MediaLab.AI Inc., owner of the Kik Messenger app, over lax age assurance practices, content moderation, and child safety failures that advocates have dubbed a "predator's paradise." The action follows a July 2025 notice of violation under the Connecticut Data Privacy Act for privacy notice deficiencies and processing sensitive data — including health, biometric, and precise geolocation data — without proper consent, which the company has only partially addressed. The new investigation seeks records related to practices that may constitute unfair or deceptive acts or practices under the CTDPA and the Connecticut Unfair Trade Practices Act. No fine has been imposed to date.
Attorney General William Tong issued a consumer alert warning Connecticut residents about unregulated, offshore decentralized finance (DeFi) cryptocurrency exchanges, naming GMX, Gains Network, dYdX, Aevo, Drift Protocol, Vertex Protocol, and Hyperliquid. The alert highlights risks including bypassing U.S. law via VPNs, predatory leverage up to 250x, misleading synthetic asset products, and lack of KYC protections. No enforcement action or penalty was imposed; at least one Connecticut consumer reportedly lost $200,000 deposited with an unregulated DeFi exchange.
$2.0M
Attorney General Tong and a coalition of four other states and the FTC sued Zillow and Redfin after Zillow paid Redfin $100 million to shut down its multifamily rental advertising business and transfer clients to Zillow. The settlement requires the companies to restore competition, with Redfin rebuilding its apartment advertising business, and pay $2 million to the coalition.
Attorney General William Tong sent a letter to the Connecticut Insurance Department urging rejection of double-digit rate increases sought by Anthem, ConnectiCare, and UnitedHealthcare for individual and small group health insurance plans covering about 220,000 people. The letter argues the rates exceed inflationary measures and criticizes the carriers for failing to control costs and for poor claims system management, particularly ConnectiCare's transition to Molina Healthcare.
$275K
Connecticut Attorney General William Tong announced a $275,000 settlement with TaxAct, an online tax preparation company, over allegations that between January 2018 and December 2022, TaxAct improperly disclosed detailed customer financial information to Meta and Google through third-party tracking technologies without notifying taxpayers. The settlement requires TaxAct to pay $275,000 and implement new third-party tracking compliance measures, including a review committee, written policies, a tag monitoring system, and two independent third-party audits.