Families are fed up with social media — and this week’s legal double whammy is just the beginning for companies like Meta
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Families are fed up with social media — and this week’s legal double whammy is just the beginning for companies like Meta
Big Tech — and especially Meta, the parent of Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp — has weathered two major legal blows in just two days.
And it’s all an indictment of how fed up regular Americans are. They are angry at the social media companies they believe have robbed them, and their children, of their attention and mental health.
In Los Angeles Wednesday, a 20-year-old girl known as KGM, who said growing up online ruined her life, emerged victorious against Meta and Google — to the tune of $3 million in compensatory damages and an additional $3 million in punitive damages. And Meta is also on the hook for $375 million after a New Mexico jury ruled on Tuesday the company failed to protect kids on their platforms.
“It is a watershed moment in the quest for online accountability,” KGM’s lawyer Matthew Bergman told me. “It is the first time a jury has found that social media is defective as designed … causing real life harm.”
During the trial, the KGM case was said to be a “bellwether” — one that, if it succeeded, could set the landscape for more to follow.
That’s sure to be the case now.
“I think this absolutely could also open up the floodgates,” attorney and author Josh Hammer told me. “Big Tech is now firmly on guard, and they know they cannot continue to lure in vulnerable young Americans with their deliberately addictive algorithms.”
Eric Goldman, professor of law at Santa Clara University in California, pointed out that the New Mexico........
