Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META), the Facebook parent company, must face lawsuits by U.S. states accusing it of encouraging social media addiction among teens, a federal judge in California ruled on Tuesday.
Oakland-based U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers rejected Meta’s bid to toss the claims made by the states in two separate lawsuits filed last year, one including more than 30 states and the other including only Florida.
The company had argued that federal law blocked some of the claims and that the states failed to point to misleading statements that it had made.
The judge put some limits on the claims that the states – numbering more than 30 in all – could pursue but allowed the case to go forward largely intact. The judge also rejected the social media company’s motion to dismiss some claims over social media addiction brought by individual plaintiffs.
The states are asking the court for injunctions against Meta’s allegedly illegal business practices and are seeking unspecified monetary damages.
Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Various plaintiffs have filed hundreds of lawsuits against Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META), ByteDance’s TikTok, and Alphabet’s YouTube, accusing the companies of designing addictive algorithms that caused anxiety, depression, and body-image issues among adolescents, and of failing to warn about these risks.
(Source: Reuters)
Maria Reed is a financial journalist with a passion for covering US equities. She joined the ABBO News team in June 2023. Maria holds an M.S. degree in International Economics and Finance from Otto-von-Guericke University in Magdeburg and is a CFA Level 2 candidate.
