Big Tech, Big Takedown 

Social media comeuppance begins. Companies must correct design choices that hurt children

Say what you will about social media companies, they never stop innovating. It’s their basic survival reflex. Finally, though, establishing the harms that they do, has also taken an ingenious route, and it’s worked! This effort used to be foiled, again and again, by the free speech argument. And by the US safe harbour provision, which protects intermediaries from being held liable for what their users post. But in the KGM vs Meta & YouTube case, plaintiffs sidestepped traditional First Amendment conversations. They reframed social media harm as a product liability issue. They persuaded the California jury that both companies “built machines designed to addict the brains of children, and they did it on purpose”.

And in a second case, a New Mexico jury has been persuaded that Meta violated state consumer protection laws, by failing to safeguard child users from child predators. True, both rulings will be appealed. Also true, their punitive damages are peanuts to companies with market caps running into trillions of $s. But what will worry them is what’s down the road – around 10,000 personal injury cases, 800 school district lawsuits, and actions from attorneys general from 40 American states. That’s in US alone. Bulwarks have, obviously, also been opened to recognise addiction as a reason for punitive damages, on a global basis.  

This could prove to be Big Tech’s tobacco moment. Internal corporate documents have shown, social media companies well know how harmful certain design choices are, and choose these, to drive growth and profit. KGM’s longest day of Instagram use ran into 16 hours. The like button that registers like a chemical hit, the beauty filters, the infinite scroll and autoplay…entice other kids to do the same. But when these companies hurt in the only place they really care about, their pockets, they will be pushed to make better choices. Less virality bias, for example, would really help children. Slow down the spread of emotionally extreme content.