A California federal judge has dismissed allegations that Mark Zuckerberg deliberately concealed Facebook and Instagram’s mental health risks from young users. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers rejected claims that the Meta CEO directed efforts to hide the platforms’ potential dangers from children.
A lawsuit filed in May against Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, is centered around a lesser-known provision of Section 230. The plaintiff, Ethan Zuckerman, a public policy professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, is seeking a federal court ruling to allow him to release software that automatically unfollows all Facebook users. This lawsuit marked the first instance of using Section 230 against a tech giant in this manner, according to Zuckerman’s legal team. This unconventional legal strategy could potentially invert the law that typically shields companies like Meta. If successful, Zuckerman’s case could empower consumers with greater control over their online experiences.
“We’re disappointed the court believes Professor Zuckerman needs to code the tool before the court resolves the case,” said Ramya Krishnan, one of Ethan Zuckerman’s lawyers. “We continue to believe that Section 230 protects user-empowering tools, and look forward to the court considering that argument at a later time.”
When the suit was brought, Meta released a statement saying, “This suit is baseless, and was filed by the plaintiff over a hypothetical browser extension that he has not even built.”
However, the numerous government lawsuits filed against Meta/Facebook stand, at least for now.
The State of New Mexico filed suit against Facebook/Meta last November charging that the world’s largest social media platform exposes minors to pornography and sexual predators. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is also named in the suit that alleges the social media company failed to adequately protect children from sexual abuse, online solicitation, and human trafficking.
In addition to that, in October a whopping civil suit was brought by 33 US states, led by Colorado and California, alleging Facebook, collects personal information of children under the age of 13 and also caused a mental health crisis among youth by making its Instagram social media platform addictive.
