US Civil Trial on Social Media Addiction

A landmark civil trial is underway in California state court, centering on allegations that social media platforms, specifically Meta Platforms===Instagram and Google===YouTube, are dangerously addictive by design to young users. Meta Platforms (parent of Meta Platforms===Instagram and Meta Platforms===Facebook) and Google===YouTube (owned by Google) are defendants, accused of engineering addiction in children's brains for profit. The plaintiff, Kaley G.M., claims severe mental harm due to social media addiction since childhood. Google===YouTube's lawyer, Luis Li, argues that Google===YouTube is not social media and not intentionally addictive, comparing it to Netflix. Plaintiffs' attorney, W. Mark Lanier, asserts that these corporations build 'traps' rather than just apps. Stanford University professor Anna Lembke testified that social media can be viewed as a drug. The trial is considered a bellwether, with its outcome potentially influencing hundreds of similar lawsuits across the United States against social media firms, drawing parallels to past litigation against the tobacco industry.