Jury finds Meta and YouTube liable in landmark child-safety cases

Jury verdicts place new liability pressure on Meta and YouTube in child-safety cases

Jurors in two U.S. states delivered verdicts that plaintiffs and advocates have long sought in lawsuits targeting major social media platforms over alleged harms to children. In Los Angeles, a jury found both Meta and YouTube liable for harms to children who used their services, according to an Associated Press report.

In New Mexico, a separate jury concluded that Meta knowingly harmed children’s mental health and concealed what it knew about child sexual exploitation on its platforms. The AP report said families, tech watchdog groups and children’s advocates cheered the outcomes.

For years, parents, teens, pediatricians, educators and whistleblowers have argued that social media can be detrimental to young people’s mental health and can lead to addiction, eating disorders, sexual exploitation and suicide. In the Associated Press account, the verdicts were framed as the first time juries in two states took that position.

Sacha Haworth, executive director of The Tech Oversight Project, said the results marked an end to what he described as Big Tech’s “invincibility,” adding that new evidence and testimony had “validated the harms young people and parents have been telling the world about for years.” The report noted that the verdicts arrive as companies have long argued that harms to children are byproducts of broader societal issues or are caused by bad actors taking advantage of safeguards.

The AP report said it was still too early to determine whether the verdicts will translate into fundamental changes in how platforms treat young users. It said the dual outcomes, however, signal a changing tide of public perception against tech companies and could spur more lawsuits and regulation. It also said Meta and YouTube both disagreed with the verdicts and were exploring legal options, including appeals.

The Los Angeles case centered on product-design claims, and the AP report said the suit had a single plaintiff who goes by the initials KGM. It said the plaintiff argued that the design features of Meta and YouTube were developed to be addictive, particularly for young users, and noted that other similar cases were being funneled into bellwether trials as test cases that could eventually lead to broader settlements.

The report also described how the lawsuits sidestepped Section 230, which generally exempts internet companies from liability for content posted by users. It said earlier lawsuits often faltered when they focused more on how platforms distributed content rather than deliberate product design.

During testimony in the Los Angeles trial, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg was asked about whether people tend to use a platform or product more if it is addictive, and the AP report said Zuckerberg responded, “I’m not sure what to say to that. I don’t think that applies here.”

The AP report said Arturo Béjar, a former Meta engineering director who raised alarms inside the company about Instagram’s harms and later testified in Congress in 2023, said jury trials “level the playing field” for such companies. Béjar also cautioned that regulation would be needed to rein in platforms, describing how an attorney general or the Federal Trade Commission stepping in could require changes.

In New Mexico, the AP report said Attorney General Raúl Torrez filed the lawsuit in 2023. It described how state investigators built the case by posing as children on social media and documenting the sexual solicitations they received, as well as Meta’s responses, with the jury asked to decide whether Meta violated New Mexico’s consumer protection law.

Legal experts cited in the AP report said the verdicts represent a change in how courts are willing to hold platforms accountable. Nikolas Guggenberger, an assistant professor of law at the University of Houston Law Center, said, “For the first time, courts have held social media platforms accountable for how their product design can harm users,” adding that the ruling could reshape an industry long shielded by Section 230.

The Associated Press report also pointed to public opinion shifts. It said a 2025 Pew Research Center poll found 48% of teens said social media harms people their age, up from 32% in 2022.

The AP report said the next phase of safety battles may extend beyond traditional social media apps, including toward artificial intelligence chatbots. Sarah Kreps, a professor and director of Cornell University’s Tech Policy Institute, said, “You can ban today’s harm, but how do you know what tomorrow is going to bring?” and added that “people will flock” to new products as demand creates supply.

As the Los Angeles and New Mexico cases move through possible appeals and settlement discussions, the AP report said experts expect the legal outcomes to take years to fully resolve. For now, the verdicts underscore growing pressure on platforms to address how their products affect children’s mental health and exposure risks.