The verdicts this week out of Los Angeles and New Mexico are terrifically good news for American families and extremely bad news for social media companies. For years these companies have hid behind a “Section 230” defense — that is, the understanding that they could not be held liable under the Communications Decency Act for what was uploaded to their platforms by users. While the companies must make “good faith” efforts to take down criminal or highly objectionable material, if some slips through, their defense is that “efforts were made.”
Yet in these decades, we have seen a proliferation of harms to social-media users, and the most heartrending cases involve children. Molly Russell, for example, took her life after being led down a rabbit hole of material glorifying suicidal depression. She was only 14. The Russell family’s lawyer had to seek therapy after viewing some of the content Molly had viewed, commenting, “It keeps sucking you deeper, I could feel it happening to myself and I’m a resilient adult.” Molly is but one of millions of children who have been negatively affected to a greater or lesser extent by what they see on social media.
But the social media companies were shielded by Section 230. Until this week, they weren’t. The Los Angeles case was undoubtedly the more legally significant verdict. Using insights offered by whistleblowers such as Frances Haugen, buttressed by shocking internal company emails brought to light in trial discovery, the legal argument was put forward that irrespective of the content, the manner in which the content was delivered was purposefully designed by these companies to be addictive. Section 230 offers no legal shield to social-media companies against lawsuits concerning how they deliver content. That “how” is the product social-media companies are offering, and if the product causes harm, consumers have the legal right to sue.
The plaintiff in the Los Angeles case is a young woman of 20, known by her initials KGM, who argued she was harmed when as a child she became addicted to social media. She has been awarded $3 million in damages, but will likely be awarded punitive damages if it is decided that the companies sued, Meta and YouTube/Google, knew their products were harmful and thus acted maliciously by not informing consumers. Since punitive damages tend to be, well, punitive, I’d expect the final award to be in the range of $10-15 million. Sure, Meta and YouTube/Google will appeal, but the door has just been opened to literally millions of possible claims. These companies could be on the hook for billions, even possibly trillions, of dollars.
The moment of reckoning has arrived, at long last. And what these companies must realize is that Americans have not one iota of sympathy for them. They have to assume that any cases that go to a jury trial will be decided against them. Every single one of us has seen the harm up close and personal in our own families.
No wonder bills banning all social media for children under 16 are proliferating — not just in U.S. states, but worldwide. Australia just expanded its ban to include any social media that uses malicious content delivery systems, such as targeted algorithm feeds, infinite scroll, auto-play of videos, persistent notifications, popularity meters and “disappearing” content that instills in users “fear of missing out.” These delivery systems are purposefully designed to create compulsive, unstoppable engagement, which companies monetize to their financial gain.
It is my fervent hope that this new threat of immense financial harm will cause social-media companies to at long last temper their practices — not just where children are concerned, but where all are concerned. The most important right our lawmakers could enshrine for Americans who engage with social media is the right to demand “no algorithmic targeting” as the default for all user accounts. This is an obvious extension of our citizens’ fundamental right to privacy, and some U.S. states are already moving in this direction, such as New York.
These verdicts should also be a wake-up call to other online sectors, including predictions markets and AI.
Prediction markets, such as Kalshi, Polymarket and Robinhood, are just online betting platforms — the new moniker is simply lipstick on the same old pig. Utah Sen. John Curtis has just co-sponsored, with California Sen. Adam Schiff, the Prediction Markets Are Gambling Act, which would stop the Commodity Futures Trading Commission from allowing such gambling contracts, making these companies subject to state regulation. These slick websites obviously also deliver their content in ways that promote addiction, and they are now vulnerable to the same type of lawsuit as Meta and YouTube/Google just lost.
AI companies should also be nervous after the Los Angeles verdict. It’s been gratifying to see some companies pulling back from obviously harmful AI deployments, such as Google’s AI health summaries. But there’s bigger fish that can be fried by lawyers now. Chatbots are purposefully designed to be engaging to the user, to the point of open sychophancy.
They engage in the promotion of delusions through unquestioning user validation, and psychiatrists have identified a new mental illness of “AI-induced psychosis.” Users report feeling compelled to be in constant contact with their chatbot, with transcripts of conversations running to the tens of thousands of pages. Both suicides and murders have been linked to chatbot use. The mental health consequences of chatbot addiction is a whole new level beyond what we have seen with social media.
It appears that 2026 will go down in the history books as the year the reckoning began for companies that monetized the harm they inflicted on the minds of our children. I offer my personal thanks to those juries in Los Angeles and New Mexico: You have given us all a ray of hope in a darkening day.