Meta Platforms, YouTube, Snap, and TikTok suffered a setback on Wednesday when a California state judge ruled that failure-to-warn claims in a consolidated lawsuit against the companies can proceed. The case, which accuses the platforms of contributing to a mental health crisis among children through their addictive features, will move forward despite the social media companies’ attempts to have the claims dismissed.
Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl’s ruling rejected the tech giants’ argument that failure-to-warn claims don’t apply outside the realm of product liability or real estate cases. The judge agreed with plaintiffs that the platforms’ operations, such as their addictive features, were foreseeable contributors to harm. “The amended complaints state a claim for negligent failure to warn under California law,” Judge Kuhl wrote.
The social media companies had also sought to dismiss the claims under the First Amendment and Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which typically shields platforms from liability over third-party content. However, Judge Kuhl found that these defenses did not apply to the platforms’ own design features. She ruled that the companies could still be held liable for app features like image filtering, data tracking, and features like geolocation, friend recommendations, and virtual gifting buttons, which could lead to potential harm such as child sexual exploitation.
