Meta Escapes Social Media Addiction Lawsuit After Plaintiff Drops Case

The plaintiff, a Florida teenager, had sued Meta and other social media companies for creating addictive platforms.

A day after Snap settled with the plaintiff in a social media addiction lawsuit, Meta escapes a similar lawsuit after the plaintiff dropped the case. In a statement, Meta said the plaintiff chose to drop his case against Meta without receiving any payment. This decision follows Meta's loss in a New Mexico case earlier this year, in which the company was ordered to pay $375 million in penalties after being found to have misled consumers about the safety of its platforms and endangered children.

The plaintiff, a Florida teenager known by the initials “R.K.C.," had sued the social media companies for creating addictive platforms. It was one of thousands of similar lawsuits from teens, schools, and state attorneys general that accused the big tech companies of knowingly creating addictive platforms.

The precedent that would have been set by this lawsuit and others could have impacted how the companies build their apps, including features like the infinite scroll and continual buzz of notifications.

The plaintiff's decision to drop the case comes after Meta's loss in a New Mexico case earlier this year. Meta was ordered to pay $375 million in penalties after the company was found to have misled consumers about the safety of its platforms and endangered children.

In March, a Los Angeles jury also handed both Meta and Google another defeat, awarding the defendant in that case some $6 million in damages.

Meta had been prepared to argue that the plaintiff in this case had allegedly only used Facebook and Instagram accounts for minutes per day on average, and was planning to claim that most of his accounts had been created after hiring a lawyer.

In its statement, Meta said that, “this outcome makes clear that we will not back away from defending ourselves against baseless lawsuits.”

Meta had been the only remaining defendant in the case, after Snap and other social media companies had reached settlement agreements with the plaintiff.

The case had been set to begin next week in the Superior Court of California in Los Angeles.

• The plaintiff's decision to drop the case follows a series of losses for Meta in court, including the New Mexico case and a Los Angeles jury verdict in March.

• Meta's losses in court could impact how the company builds its apps, including features like the infinite scroll and continual buzz of notifications.

• The case had been seen as a bellwether for similar lawsuits from teens, schools, and state attorneys general that accused the big tech companies of knowingly creating addictive platforms.

• Meta's statement suggests that the company will continue to defended itself against lawsuits it sees as baseless.