US Appeals Court Rejects Tech Giants' Immunity Claims on Addiction Lawsuits

A US appeals court has rejected the immunity claims of several major tech companies, including Meta, Google, and TikTok. The companies had argued that a 1996 law granted them protection from lawsuits related to designing products that cause addiction in children and young people.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed the appeal filed by the social media parent companies, upholding a previous ruling by a federal judge in Los Angeles that allowed thousands of lawsuits against tech companies to proceed. The court denied Meta's request to postpone a trial in a lawsuit filed by 19 states, which is set to begin this Wednesday in Oakland.

Judge Jacqueline Hong-Ngoc Nguyen wrote in the decision that the court 'does not agree' with the tech companies' arguments and that the law does not specify in which scenarios immunity applies. The ruling marks a new setback for Meta, following a district court's order last week to pay $567 million into a youth mental health reparation fund due to its operating methods being considered harmful to adolescents.