A Los Angeles jury has ruled in favor of a 20-year-old woman who sued Meta and YouTube over her childhood addiction to social media.
The jury found that Meta, which owns Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp, and Google, owner of YouTube, intentionally built addictive social media platforms that harmed the woman's mental health.
The woman, known as Kaley, was awarded $3m (£2.2m) in damages, with Meta found to be 70% responsible for the harm and YouTube responsible for 30%.
Company Responses
Meta stated: "Teen mental health is profoundly complex and cannot be linked to a single app." A spokesperson for Google said: "This case misunderstands YouTube, which is a responsibly built streaming platform, not a social media site."
According to reports from the BBC, the verdict may have implications for hundreds of similar cases currently going through US courts.
Investigation and Trial
Kaley's lawyers argued that Meta and YouTube had built "addiction machines" and failed in their responsibility to prevent children from accessing their platforms.
Kaley started using Instagram at age nine and YouTube at age six, with no attempts to block her due to her age, and later developed anxiety, depression, and body dysmorphia.
Expert Testimony
Mike Proulx, a research director for Forrester, said the verdict underlines a "breaking point" between social media companies and the public, with negative sentiment toward social media building for years.
Mark Zuckerberg, Meta's chairman and chief executive, had previously testified that his company's policy was not to allow users under 13 on its platforms, despite internal research showing young children were using them.
