Snap settles US social media trial days after Meta

Snap has settled what would have been another landmark trial over the alleged harms of social media, lawyers for the plaintiffs said Monday, just days after Meta reached its own settlement and two days before opening statements were due to begin in a Los Angeles courtroom.

The case was to be the latest in a series of bellwether, or test, trials whose outcomes are expected to guide the resolution of hundreds of similar lawsuits across the United States.

“We are proud to have achieved justice for our bellwether clients so far, including K.D.B. and S.J.,” the lawyers said in a statement, referring to the plaintiffs, who are identified only by their initials.

“Our ultimate goal is to hold these social media companies accountable for how their actions have impacted millions of children across the country, and these settlements allow us to keep building toward that goal.”

Snap, the maker of Snapchat, said in a statement that it was “pleased to have been able to resolve this matter in an amicable manner.”

Meta confirmed a settlement with KDB on Friday, after previously settling with SJ, which left Snap as the sole defendant in the case which consolidated claims from two lawsuits.

Sources close to Meta told AFP the company decided to settle for business reasons.

TikTok and YouTube were also named as defendants in the case, but both had already reached settlements as well.

Lawyers for SJ and KDB were expected to argue that their clients were exposed to “addictive and problematic” social media apps when they started using them at ages 13 and 15, respectively, according to court documents.

Twists and turns

Thousands of lawsuits have been filed in recent years in local, state and federal courtrooms across the country with various claims about alleged harms to children and teenagers caused by social media companies.

The cases – the first of which went to trial earlier this year in Los Angeles – have taken twists and turns.

Meta and YouTube lost the first so-called bellwether case earlier this year, when a jury found them collectively liable for harming a young user known by the initials KGM, and ordered the tech companies to pay a combined $6 million penalty.

Snap and TikTok settled with KGM ahead of that trial.

Months later, Snap, TikTok and YouTube settled another case that was set to go to trial in August; that plaintiff, known as RKC, then withdrew their remaining claims against Meta, allowing the Instagram and Facebook maker to avoid trial without a settlement.

By settling before a trial kicks off, the social media companies contain costs from lawyer fees and potential penalties.

Another benefit is that it shields their executives from testifying in court or insider documents spilling into the public domain.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Instagram chief Adam Mosseri and Snap CEO Evan Spiegel had been expected to be called as key witnesses in the upcoming Los Angeles trial.

In August, Meta agreed to pay more than US$18 billion in penalties, in addition to making changes to Instagram and Facebook for teens, when it settled with 52 attorneys general several days into a trial held in California.

That settlement came just a day after Mosseri testified, and before Zuckerberg had been called to the stand.

Meta has faced other trials, though.

Earlier this month, a New Mexico judge ordered Meta to pay US$25 billion in a case where the company was found liable for deceiving users in the state about how their data was used in a case related to the Cambridge Analytica scandal.

A New Mexico jury also found the social media giant liable for harms to children, leading to a combined penalty of US$942 million earlier this year.

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