Social Media Giants Accused of Building ‘Addictive’ Platforms as US Trial Begins
A high-profile trial examining the impact of social media on young people’s mental health has opened in California, with lawyers accusing the owners of Instagram and YouTube of deliberately designing platforms that encourage compulsive use among children.
The case, which began on Monday before a Los Angeles Superior Court judge and jury, centres on claims by a former teenage user identified only by her initials, K.G.M., who alleges that excessive use of social media contributed to serious mental health challenges during her childhood.
In his opening statement, the plaintiff’s lawyer, Mark Lanier, argued that the companies behind Instagram and YouTube knowingly engineered features intended to keep young users engaged for as long as possible. He told the court that internal company goals and design choices prioritised user attention over children’s wellbeing, and that the risks were not adequately disclosed to families.
According to Lanier, documents and internal communications will be presented during the trial to show that executives closely tracked how much time users spent on their platforms and pushed for increases in engagement. He also accused YouTube, which is owned by Google, of steering young users towards its main platform because it generated higher advertising revenue than its child-focused alternative.
Lawyers representing Meta, which owns Instagram, and YouTube rejected the claims, arguing that the plaintiff’s difficulties were rooted in complex personal and family circumstances rather than the design of the platforms themselves. Meta’s legal team told jurors that K.G.M. had faced significant challenges at home from an early age and had received professional support long before she began using Instagram.
The defence said the court must consider whether social media was truly a major factor in her struggles, or whether other aspects of her upbringing played a larger role.
The trial is expected to last about six weeks and is being closely watched because of its potential implications for similar lawsuits across the United States. Jurors are expected to hear testimony from mental health experts, former employees of social media companies, and senior executives, including Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg, Instagram head Adam Mosseri, and YouTube CEO Neal Mohan.
The case is one of many legal actions brought by families, school districts and state authorities who argue that social media companies should be held accountable for the effects of features such as autoplay, infinite scrolling and algorithm-driven recommendations on young users.
In a related development, a group of US state attorneys general recently asked a federal court to order Meta to make sweeping changes to its platforms, including stricter age controls and the removal of certain engagement-driven features for minors. The states argued that recent safety measures introduced by the company fall short of offering meaningful protection.
Meta has said it has introduced new safeguards for teenage users in recent years, including tighter content controls and limits for younger accounts. The company, along with other social media firms, maintains that it is not legally responsible for content posted by users and that it provides tools to help families manage online activity.
Snap, the parent company of Snapchat, and TikTok were previously named in the lawsuit but reached settlements with the plaintiff last month and are no longer part of the case.
The outcome of the trial could set an important precedent for how courts assess claims about social media design and its impact on children’s mental health.
