Meta and YouTube have been found guilty on all seven counts in a landmark trial in Los Angeles that could shape the future of social media in the U.S.
The verdict comes a day after a similar verdict was reached on a case in New Mexico, where a jury ordered Meta to pay $375 million for violating consumer protection laws.
In the Los Angeles case, a jury awarded the 20-year-old plaintiff, identified as Kaley or KGM in court documents, $3 million in compensatory damages. After more than 40 hours of deliberation across nine days, California jurors decided that Meta and YouTube were negligent in the design or operation of their platforms and that this negligence was a substantial factor in causing harm to Kaley, AP News reports.
Kaley testified that her use of social media as a child, starting with YouTube at age 6 and Instagram at age 9, addicted her to the technology and exacerbated her mental health struggles.
The jury determined that features such as infinite scroll were deliberately engineered to maximize engagement at the expense of mental health, contributing to Kaley’s struggles with depression and suicidal thoughts.
The multimillion-dollar verdict is expected to grow, as the jury decided the companies acted with malice, or highly egregious conduct, meaning the trial will now move into a second phase to determine punitive damages.
Meta and Google-owned YouTube were the two remaining defendants in this case. TikTok and Snap, the other defendants, settled before the trial began.
