According to the plaintiff in the lawsuit, using social media from an early age made her addicted to this technology, which led to the development of depression and suicidal thoughts. The defendants include: Meta – the owner of Facebook and Instagram, ByteDance – the owner of TikTok, and Google, which owns YouTube. Another of the defendants – Snapchat – was supposed to reach a settlement with the mysterious “KGM” last week. However, no details are known about the settlement and its financial terms. Just before the trial began, TikTok also reached a settlement, as reported by the BBC. The company's representative did not provide details.
The trial, which began Tuesday in Los Angeles Superior Court, is the first time major social media companies will testify before a jury in this type of case, CBS News reports. The following persons are to appear in court as a witness: Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg. The jury selection process is expected to take several days.
Experts say the trial could be a landmark for more than a thousand similar cases brought against social media players in recent years. Depending on the outcome, technology giants may be forced to fundamentally change the principles of operation of their platforms. “The trial will also be a test of what damages, if any, can be awarded to the plaintiffs,” said Clay Calvert of the independent American Enterprise Institute, as quoted by CBS News.
See also: The European Commission has punished the social media giant. Three charges
In her lawsuit, the 19-year-old plaintiff claims that the social media addiction and mental illness she suffered were the result of deliberate design decisions by companies that wanted to make their platforms more addictive for children in order to increase profits. If this argument is accepted by the court, it could undermine existing legal protections that shield companies from liability for material published on their platforms.
“Defendants intentionally installed a number of designs into their products designed to maximize youth engagement in order to increase advertising revenues,” the lawsuit says.
The process may take six to eight weeks. According to the BBC, the company's bosses claim that there is no convincing evidence of their direct guilt. They argue that any damage results from individual user behavior.
“Recently, a number of lawsuits have attempted to place the blame for teen mental health problems squarely on social media companies,” reads a recent post on the Meta blog, as cited by CBS News. — “But this oversimplifies a serious issue. Clinicians and researchers are discovering that mental health is a deeply complex and multidimensional issue, and trends in adolescent well-being are neither clear-cut nor universal.”
