A Los Angeles jury has struck a landmark blow against social media powerhouses Meta and YouTube, holding them responsible for designing platforms that hooked a young woman on addictive content from childhood, with devastating effects on her mental health.
The 20-year-old, known as Kaley, won $6 million in damages—$3 million compensatory and $3 million punitive—after jurors found Meta, owner of Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp, and Google, YouTube’s parent, acted with malice, oppression or fraud. Meta must pay 70%, Google 30%.
Both firms plan to appeal, with Meta insisting, “Teen mental health is profoundly complex and cannot be linked to a single app. We will continue to defend ourselves vigorously as every case is different, and we remain confident in our record of protecting teens online.” Google called YouTube “a responsibly built streaming platform, not a social media site.”
Outside court, parents of other affected children erupted in joy on Wednesday after the five-week trial. The verdict echoes a recent New Mexico ruling against Meta for exposing kids to explicit material and predators.
Forrester’s Mike Proulx sees this as a tipping point. “Negative sentiment toward social media has been building for years, and now it’s finally boiled over,” he said. Globally, Australia has imposed under-16 age checks, while the UK tests a youth ban showing 15% screen time drops.
Kaley started Instagram at nine and YouTube at six, facing no barriers. “I stopped engaging with family because I was spending all my time on social media,” she testified, linking it to anxiety, depression and body dysmorphia from filters and endless scrolls.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg admitted wishing for faster child-detection tech, while Instagram’s Adam Mosseri downplayed her 16-hour days as merely “problematic.” Snapchat and TikTok settled earlier.
Kaley’s lawyers hailed it as proof no firm is above accountability for children. Another major case looms in California federal court this June, amid U.S. warnings of teen brain risks akin to tobacco and EU fines topping €1.2 billion.