YouTube appeals verdict in child social media addiction case

YouTube has appealed a landmark verdict in a social media addiction lawsuit in Los Angeles, challenging a jury's finding that the company designed its platform to hook young users without concern for their well-being. The appeal was filed on Monday in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

The move came less than a week after Meta, which was also a defendant in the case, filed its own notice of appeal. The case centred on a 20-year-old woman who said she became addicted to social media as a child and that it worsened her mental health struggles.

The jury found that negligence by Google-owned YouTube and Meta was a substantial factor in causing harm to the woman, who was identified in court by her initials, KGM, and her first name, Kaley. It awarded her USD 3 million in damages and recommended an additional USD 3 million in punitive damages. Her lead attorney, Mark Lanier, said in a statement last week after Meta's appeal that Kaley's legal team expected the appellate court to "continue the careful application of the law to this case, affirming the verdict of the trial court."

Jose Castaneda, a Google spokesperson, said last week that YouTube was planning to appeal and that "these are standard motions for this case to move forward." Lawyers for the company are expected to set out their arguments in later court filings. Earlier, Meta and Google had each filed post-trial motions seeking a new trial, but Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl denied those motions in early June.

During the five-week trial, one of YouTube's main arguments was that its video-sharing and streaming service is not a social media platform. Lawyers for both YouTube and Meta also repeatedly questioned whether the evidence and arguments in the case crossed into legal protections for technology companies over content posted by third parties. Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act shields such companies from legal responsibility for that content. The plaintiff's lawyers instead focused on design features such as autoplay, arguing that they could lead to longer-lasting and less intentional use of the platforms.

Kaley's case was described as a first-of-its-kind lawsuit, and the verdict could influence thousands of similar cases accusing social media companies of deliberately causing harm. TikTok and Snapchat parent Snap Inc were also initially named as defendants, but both settled for undisclosed amounts before the trial began. The appeals by YouTube and Meta now mark the next stage in the case over claims that social media platform design harmed a young user.

With PTI Inputs