Overview
- Meta was found liable in New Mexico on Wednesday with a $375 million award over failures that left minors exposed to predators, and a Los Angeles jury on Thursday found Meta and YouTube liable for harms to a young woman and awarded $6 million.
- The Los Angeles case focused on how features like infinite scroll, autoplay, beauty filters, personalized feeds, and constant notifications were built to keep kids engaged in ways jurors concluded caused addiction and mental-health harm.
- Trial evidence included internal Meta documents and testimony indicating the company knew Instagram could harm minors and did not adequately act, while the plaintiff described compulsive use starting in childhood that worsened anxiety, depression, and body-image issues.
- Meta and Google said they will appeal and argued teen mental health has many causes, pointing to parental controls, default teen privacy settings, and “take a break” tools they say are designed to improve safety.
- More than 2,000 similar lawsuits are pending, and repeated losses could force costly settlements or design changes, as advocates press for a federal duty of care through the Kids Online Safety Act and point to moves abroad such as EU safety-by-design rules, Australia’s under‑16 limits, and Brazil’s curbs on infinite scroll and autoplay for children.