Social Media Harm Lawsuit Attonreys

Social Media Harm To Children Lawsuit Attorneys

Well-known social media companies responsible for popular platforms including Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and Snapchat are facing numerous wrongful death and other lawsuits for teen suicides and mental harm related to use of their products. People whose children regularly used social media and developed suicidal behavior or experienced harm may be eligible for compensation.

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Our Role

On November 10, 2022, Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers appointed Seeger Weiss co-founder Chris Seeger to serve as co-lead counsel in the In Re: Social Media Adolescent Addiction/Personal Injury Products Liability Litigation. Seeger was one of three lawyers selected to lead the multidistrict litigation pending in the Northern District of California. Our firm represents hundreds of families who filed product liability lawsuits alleging social media companies failed to provide protections to minor-aged users and designed their platforms to promote harmful behavior.

Case Updates

  • 2/2/24

    Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers denied defendants’ motion for an interlocutory appeal of her ruling on their motions to dismiss stating that the appeal ‘would likely lead to piecemeal appeals, compound delays, and increase inefficacies’.

  • 1/2/24

    As of January 2, there are 482 filed In re: Social Media Adolescent Addiction/Personal Injury Products Liability Litigation, including more than 200 school board cases.

  • 11/14/23

    Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers rejected the social media defense’s motions to dismiss the bulk of the Plaintiffs’ claims accusing the companies of failing to warn of the known dangers of social media, including the danger of addiction and mental health harms, and providing no real tools for parents to protect their children from the dangerous products.

    The Court’s ruling is a significant victory for the families that have been harmed by the dangers of the social media industry. The Court’s ruling is a direct repudiation of the companies’ overbroad and incorrect claim that Section 230 or the 1st Amendment grants them blanket immunity for the serious harm they cause to their users. The Court recognized that plaintiffs’ claims are not focused on the publishing or monitoring of third-party content, but on  the core problem – the companies’ deliberate product design choices that injure young users.

  • 11/7/23

    During a session of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology, and Law, a second whistleblower revealed that Meta had knowledge of the risks confronting young users on their platforms, but opted not to implement protective measures. Arturo Bejar, a former Facebook engineering director and consultant for Instagram, disclosed that Meta’s leadership—including CEO Mark Zuckerberg—disregarded his research findings and rejected safety recommendations for both Facebook and Instagram.

  • 10/27/23

    The court held a hearing on the Motions to Dismiss, specifically on the defense’s 1st Amendment, Section 230, and product liability arguments. The judge expressed skepticism of the defense’s “all or nothing arguments” and assertions that they owed users “no duty” to make their products safe.

  • 10/24/23

    42 U.S. attorneys general filed a lawsuit against Meta, alleging that Facebook and Instagram have features that are addictive and specifically target children and teenagers.

    The lawsuit alleges that Meta violated its obligations under the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) by unlawfully collecting the personal data of its youngest users without parents’ consent.

  • 7/25/23

    Plaintiffs submitted their opposition to defendants’ motion to dismiss based on Section 230 and First Amendment protections. Plaintiffs argued that neither Section 230 nor the First Amendment should protect Big Tech companies from liability for the harm caused by their products, especially when their products are intentionally designed to addict adolescent users.

  • 6/27/23

    Defendants filed a motion to dismiss plaintiffs’ claims Section 230 and First Amendment grounds.

  • 6/15/23

    As of June 15, 2023, there are 308 lawsuits filed In re: Social Media Adolescent Addiction/Personal Injury Products Liability Litigation, including 44 school board cases.

  • 5/18/23

    In Gonzalez v. Google, the Supreme Court declined to rule on whether section 230 provides platforms with immunity when they make targeted recommendations but vacated the judgment of the Ninth Circuit. The Court’s decision left the extent of Section 230 protections open to future adjudication.

  • 3/10/23

    An unredacted version of the master complaint was filed exposing more details of the claims against defendants Meta, ByteDance, Snap, and Google. The never-before-seen documents show that social media companies knew of the crisis in youth mental health brought on by their products. This includes burying internal research documenting harm, blocking safety measures, and defunding teams focused on protecting youth mental health.

  • 2/15/23

    Plaintiffs, co-led by Chris Seeger, filed a master complaint detailing the claims against defendants Meta, ByteDance, Snap, and Google. The complaint alleges that defendants intentionally designed social media platforms Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Snapchat, and YouTube to target and addict children through hazardous features that exploit the neurobiology of the young brain. Seeger Weiss represents hundreds of effected families and children whose compulsive overuse of social media has led to severe mental health harms.

  • 11/10/22

    Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers appointed Seeger Weiss founder Chris Seeger to serve as co-lead counsel in the In Re: Social Media Adolescent Addiction/Personal Injury Products Liability Litigation alongside Lexi Hazam of Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein LLP and Previn Warren of Motley Rice LLC.

  • 10/06/22

    The Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (JPML) ordered pending social media product liability lawsuits from across the country centralized in the Northern District of California before the Honorable Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers.