A Los Angeles jury on Wednesday rendered a verdict of liability against Meta and Google, finding that their Instagram and YouTube platforms created harmful digital addiction in children. The plaintiff was awarded $3 million in damages, 70 percent to be paid by Meta and 30 percent by Google.
Later in the day, the jury assigned $2.1 million in punitive damages against Meta and $900,000 against Google. That is a mere fraction of the $1 billion in punitive damages sought by the plaintiff.
Full disclosure-I own shares in both companies. Snapchat and TikTok were originally named as co-defendants but settled in advance of the trial.
Does the judgment now spell doom for the social media giants under an avalanche of thousands of other similar lawsuits? No. It is doubtful that the verdict will withstand the scrutiny of various appeals, particularly if it reaches the U.S. Supreme Court.
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The case was brought in state court by a 20-year-old California woman identified only as Kaley G.M. Her lawyers argued that Meta and Google targeted children by engineering their platforms to be harmfully addictive and by deploying algorithms to keep them hooked.
Kaley logged on to YouTube when she was six years old, added Instagram when she was nine, and it escalated from there. She was documented spending over 16 hours in a single day on Instagram when she was 16 years old.
Kaley contended that she developed acute depression, anxiety, body dysmorphia and suicidal thoughts solely because of the addictive features on the platforms. On the witness stand, she testified that negative online comments contributed to her declining mental condition. But so did not receiving enough "likes" from subscribers.
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"I would just get really upset and sad and feel like I wasn't worthy, I guess," said Kaley. As her dependency grew, so did her insecurity. "Without my phone, I felt like a huge part of me was missing… without my phone, I couldn't see who was liking my stuff," she added.
By her own admission, Kaley's compulsive or obsessive reliance on social media was all about her engagement with its content posted by other users. That is the plaintiff's greatest obstacle during the inevitable appeal.
Why? Because in 1996, Congress passed the Communications Decency Act. Section 230 provides that platforms cannot be held liable for the content posted on their sites. It is a form of immunity that has never been repealed.
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In 2023, the Supreme Court upheld that legal protection by refusing to hold social media companies liable for harmful, user-generated content amplified by their algorithms. Since that is the core of the plaintiff's design defect theory against Meta and Google, the Justices would have to deviate significantly from their established view to uphold the verdict. That is unlikely.
But there is a broader First Amendment protection that originates in our federal Constitution. Internet companies are fundamentally involved in free speech. They are open forums for expression that act as a modern public square, and they are afforded the same protected rights as any other speech. Minors also have significant First Amendment rights, as past Supreme Court decisions have held.
Beyond those protections, there are other grounds for appeal. On its face, Kaley's story sounds quite compelling. Indeed, at least one juror was seen to be crying as she testified. However, there were serious problems with her narrative of what was the actual or proximate cause of the purported harm.
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Over several years, Kaley was treated by three therapists, none of whom ever diagnosed her with social media addiction. Instead, the documented evidence strongly suggested that her struggles coincided with a tumultuous home environment that included alleged physical and emotional abuse.
Moreover, the plaintiff's lawyers filed the case under the legal theory known as "product liability." They argued that Instagram and YouTube were defectively designed and operated and, therefore, inherently unsafe for young people.
Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified that there was nothing defective about his platform. He explained to the jury that his company's apps were created to give users something useful, not to addict them, and that Instagram does not seek to attract children as users.
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Zuckerberg insisted that Meta had enacted a strict policy that children under 13 years of age are not allowed on the platform and are removed when identified. He recounted efforts to confirm users' ages and emphasized how safety tools were installed, such as privacy settings and content restrictions for minors.
There is persuasive evidence that Kaley misused social media by her incessant and chronic usage. Of course, just about anything done excessively carries the risk of harm. This is where the concept of personal responsibility comes into play.
Granted, a child cannot always be expected to make reasonable decisions. That is why parental oversight and control are crucial. But here, they seem to have been conspicuously absent.
If a child constantly binges on chocolate and then suffers obesity, or worse, is a company like Hersey to blame? No sensible person believes that chocolate bars are defectively designed to cause addiction because we rely on the exercise of common sense in moderation and self-restraint.
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Producers of products are in the business of creating and selling goods that are attractive to consumers. But any product can be abused. Television shows and video games are comparable examples where the goal is to keep people engaged. It is not the responsibility of a producer to act as a personal guardian over each and every user. Where minors are involved, that duty rests with a vigilant and caring parent.
A sympathetic L.A. jury was swayed by the unfortunate plight of Kaley's young life. But shifting the blame from personal responsibility to a corporate scapegoat would set in motion an explosion of ruinous litigation by thousands of other plaintiffs that could cripple social media companies.
In the end, billions of active and responsible users would suffer the inevitable consequences.
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