"The complaint is the latest addition to sprawling litigation against technology companies across multiple jurisdictions and courts. The city's complaint targeted features on Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube. The companies designed, marketed, and distributed their platforms to "maximize the number of children," using "algorithms that wield data as a weapon against children and fuel the addiction machine," according to the complaint filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York."
"Social media addiction lawsuits "fundamentally misunderstand how YouTube works and the allegations are simply not true," said José Castañeda, a Google Spokesperson. "YouTube is a streaming service" rather than a "social network where people go to catch up with friends." The other defendants didn't immediately respond to requests for comment. The city's suit is separate from multidistrict litigation encompassing thousands of similar addictiveness lawsuits from state attorneys general, school districts, and individuals."
New York City alleges that Meta, Snap, ByteDance and Google deliberately designed social media products to be addictive to adolescents, creating a youth mental health crisis that strains city resources. The claims target features on Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube and assert platforms were designed, marketed and distributed to maximize child users using algorithms that wield data as a weapon and fuel addiction. The city brings public nuisance and negligence claims seeking damages and an injunction. Google disputes the characterization of YouTube and differentiates it as a streaming service rather than a social network. The suit is separate from a pending MDL in California.
Read at Bloomberglaw
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