Jury Selection Begins in Los Angeles Social Media Addiction Case Against Snap and Meta

Attorneys for Meta and Snap are returning to court this week as another trial examines allegations that their social media platforms were designed to keep children and teenagers coming back.

Jury selection is scheduled to begin Wednesday at Los Angeles Superior Court in what could become another bellwether case. The lawsuit was brought by two teenage girls who say features including Snapchat’s “Snapstreaks,” frequent push alerts and public view counts contributed to the decline of their mental health.

One plaintiff, an 18-year-old Mississippi resident identified as “K.D.B.,” alleges that compulsive use of Snapchat and Instagram, the Meta-owned platform, played a role in her depression, anxiety, self-harm and suicidal thoughts.

“To this day, the addictive qualities of Defendants’ products and their harmful algorithms are not fully known or understood by minor users or their parents,” the plaintiffs’ attorneys wrote in the complaint.

A Snap spokesperson told ABC News that the allegations inaccurately portray the plaintiffs’ experiences on the platform.

“From the beginning, Snapchat was built differently from traditional social media: it opens to a camera, not a feed, not a ranking of what other people post or other social comparison metrics. We have built safeguards into the platform, introduced safety tools and educational resources, and we believe the evidence will support that we have put our community first, and that these allegations fundamentally misrepresent the plaintiffs’ experiences on Snapchat and how our platform was designed,” the Snap spokesperson said.

Meta has also rejected claims that it fails to protect young people, citing measures such as its Teen Accounts and other youth-safety tools.

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Responding to the latest lawsuit, a Meta spokesperson told ABC News, “We disagree with these allegations and will defend ourselves in court. A young person’s mental health is shaped by many factors, as the evidence in this trial will show. The plaintiff used TikTok far more than Instagram or Facebook, and her personal circumstances were a substantial factor in her struggles,” adding, “We’ve spent more than a decade building protections for teens, and our agreement with 52 bipartisan attorneys general goes even further with strict time limits, no access at night, and no notifications during school hours. We hope the rest of our industry joins us in setting this new standard.”

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Snap CEO Evan Spiegel and Instagram chief Adam Mosseri are expected to take the witness stand in November.

The case follows a major trial held in the same courtroom in March, when a jury found Meta and YouTube liable to plaintiff “K.G.M.” and awarded her $6 million. Both companies are appealing the verdict, while Snap and TikTok reached settlements before that trial began.

Meta has been drawn into a series of significant legal fights this year, with states, school districts and individual users turning to the courts to seek financial penalties and force changes to the way technology companies design their products.

In an August settlement involving 48 states, Meta agreed to pay as much as $18 billion and make major changes affecting younger users, including introducing time limits, removing certain filters and concealing like totals. The company did not acknowledge wrongdoing.

Meta is urging other technology companies, including TikTok, YouTube and Snap, to adopt comparable safeguards as part of what it describes as a “new industry standard” for protecting young users.