Los Angeles Jury Finds Meta and YouTube Liable in Landmark Social Media Addiction Trial

LOS ANGELES — A Los Angeles jury on Wednesday found Meta Platforms and Google’s YouTube liable for harming a young woman who said she became addicted to social media as a child, a verdict that could influence hundreds of similar lawsuits pending across the United States.

Jurors concluded that the companies intentionally designed addictive platforms that damaged the mental health of the plaintiff, a 20-year-old identified in court as Kaley. They awarded her a total of $6 million.

Compensatory and Punitive Damages

The jury awarded $3 million in compensatory damages and an additional $3 million in punitive damages after determining that Meta and Google acted with malice, oppression or fraud in how they operated their platforms. Meta, which owns Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp, is responsible for 70% of the award, with Google covering the remaining 30%.

The verdict followed a five-week trial that drew parents of other young people who say they were harmed by social media. Many gathered outside the courthouse throughout the proceedings and celebrated when the decision was announced.

Companies Plan to Appeal

Both companies said they disagreed with the verdict and intended to appeal. Meta said teen mental health is complex and cannot be linked to a single app, adding that it would continue to defend itself and remained confident in its record of protecting teens online.

A Google spokesperson said the case misunderstood YouTube, describing it as a responsibly built streaming platform rather than a social media site.

Back-to-Back Defeats

The Los Angeles decision came one day after a jury in New Mexico found Meta liable over the way its platforms endangered children, including exposing them to sexually explicit material and contact with predators.

Mike Proulx, a research director at advisory firm Forrester, told the BBC that the consecutive verdicts showed relations between social media companies and the public had reached a breaking point, saying negative sentiment had been building for years.

Wider Legal and Policy Pressure

The case is among the first of a large group of lawsuits brought by families, school districts and states accusing social media companies of designing products that encourage compulsive use among minors. Plaintiffs in those cases argue that features such as endless scrolling, autoplay and algorithmic recommendations were engineered to maximize engagement at the expense of young users’ wellbeing.

The technology companies have long contested such claims, pointing to parental controls, teen account protections and the difficulty of attributing mental health outcomes to any single cause.

Outside the United States, governments have also moved to restrict young people’s access to social media. Australia has imposed limits on children’s use of the platforms, and the United Kingdom is running a pilot program to examine how a ban for people under 16 might work.

Legal analysts expect the Los Angeles verdict to be closely studied by attorneys on both sides as other cases proceed toward trial. Although the damages are modest relative to the companies’ size, the finding of liability, and particularly the punitive award, could shape settlement negotiations and the strategy of future litigation.