Social Media Addiction: Social media addiction among youth is becoming a matter of serious concern for the world. Many countries have decided to ban social media platforms for children. Meanwhile, a jury in California on Wednesday delivered a major verdict in a historic case to social media addiction. In which an additional penalty payment of $3 million has been recommended on Meta and YouTube.

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Meta and YouTube will have to pay millions of dollars in damages to a 20-year-old woman after a jury ruled that social media giants and video streaming service providers Meta and YouTube designed their platforms to addict young users without regard to their well-being, reports news agency AP.

The verdict in this first-of-its-kind lawsuit, delivered by a jury in California on Wednesday, could affect the outcome of thousands of similar lawsuits accusing social media companies of intentionally causing harm. The plaintiff, known by her initials KGM, testified during the trial that she became addicted to social media as a child and that the addiction worsened her mental health problems. After more than 40 hours of deliberations, a majority of the jury agreed, awarding him $3 million in damages.

The jury later recommended an additional $3 million in punitive damages, ruling that the companies acted with malice, harassment or fraud in harming children through their platforms. The judge has the final authority to decide the amount of compensation. This is the second ruling against Meta this week; Earlier, a jury in New Mexico had determined that the company violated state law and harmed the mental health and safety of children.

Meta, the parent company of Instagram and Facebook, and YouTube, owned by Google, issued statements disagreeing with the decision and saying they would pursue their legal options, including appealing. Google spokesman Jose Castañeda said the decision misrepresents YouTube, “which is a responsible streaming platform, not a social media site.” A spokesperson for Meta said that teen mental health “is extremely complex and cannot be pinned down to any one app.”

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Peter Ormrod, an associate professor of law at Villanova University, called the decision “a huge development,” but added that it is “just one step in a very long story” and he does not expect to see any major changes to these platforms immediately. “I don’t think this is a definitive victory, and I think there’s still a long way to go before you see a ‘master settlement’ like we often see in tobacco and opioid lawsuits,” he said. Ormrod said that in order to make such a significant change to the way these platforms operate, Meta and YouTube would probably have to lose their legal arguments on appeal and other ‘bellwether trials’ (ie test cases), or have more such cases filed against them.

The jury determined that Meta and YouTube were negligent in the design or operation of their respective platforms, and that this negligence was a material factor in causing the plaintiffs’ harm. They also determined that each company knew that their platforms could be dangerous when used by minors; And they agreed that they failed to properly warn of the danger, causing further harm to the plaintiffs.

Only nine of the 12 jurors had to agree on each claim against each defendant. Two jurors consistently disagreed with the remaining 10 jurors on whether the companies should be held liable, but a majority of the jurors agreed on all seven claims against each company. Jurors also decided that Meta had a greater degree of responsibility for the damages caused to KGM—or Kaley, as his lawyers called him during the trial. The jury said that Meta bore 70% responsibility, while YouTube bore the remaining 30% responsibility. This split was also reflected in the $3 million punitive damages award, with the jury awarding $2.1 million to Meta and $9 million to YouTube.

According to the report, Meta and YouTube were the only two remaining defendants in the case. TikTok and Snap had reached a settlement even before the trial began. One juror, who didn’t feel comfortable giving his full name, told reporters outside the courtroom that Mark Zuckerberg’s testimony, and the way he “changed his stance repeatedly,” did not sit well with the jury.

He also said that he agreed to $6 million in damages, even though some jurors were in favor of a higher amount, because they were concerned that it would not be fair to award so much money to a single plaintiff all at once. But the jury still wanted the companies to understand that they did not find their practices acceptable. “We wanted them to realize that,” he said.

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