Juries in California and New Mexico last week held Meta and Alphabet's YouTube liable for harms to young users, awarding a total of over $381 million in damages. The cases targeted platform features rather than third-party content, challenging long-standing Section 230 protections. Company lawyers have vowed to appeal the rulings.
A California jury awarded $6 million to a young woman identified as KGM. The plaintiff argued that features on Instagram and YouTube, including infinite scroll, autoplay, and notifications, caused her addiction. Evidence included internal Meta documents supporting these claims against the platforms' designs for engaging young users.
