Meta Platforms has settled a lawsuit brought by an 18-year-old woman who accused the company of designing Instagram and Facebook to encourage addictive use, contributing to mental health problems and disordered eating.
The settlement, announced by attorneys for the plaintiff on Friday, came after jury selection began on Wednesday in a Los Angeles state court trial involving claims against Meta and Snap, the parent company of Snapchat. Meta had already reached a settlement with the other plaintiff, identified as S.J., days before the proceedings began.
The latest agreement with the second plaintiff, identified as K.D.B., means the trial is now expected to continue against Snap alone. Financial terms of the settlement were not disclosed.
Register for the next Tekedia Mini-MBA.
Register for Tekedia AI in Business Masterclass.
Join Tekedia Capital Syndicate and co-invest in great global startups.
“We remain committed to improving safety for kids on social media apps and holding tech companies accountable, and we are pleased to have brought this matter to a just resolution on behalf of our client,” Emily Jeffcott, an attorney for K.D.B., said in a statement.
The case is part of a wider legal campaign targeting social media companies over allegations that their platforms were deliberately designed to encourage compulsive use among children and teenagers. Meta, Snap, TikTok and Alphabet’s YouTube face hundreds of lawsuits from individuals, school districts, municipalities and government entities alleging that their products contributed to a youth mental health crisis involving anxiety, depression and suicide.
The settlements remove Meta from another closely watched trial, but the legal exposure facing the industry remains substantial. The proceedings against Snap could still provide an opportunity for a jury to examine allegations about the design of social media platforms and the responsibilities of companies operating services used extensively by young people.
The two plaintiffs in the case, S.J., a 16-year-old from Illinois, and K.D.B., an 18-year-old from Mississippi, said they began using YouTube as early as age three and other social media platforms around age nine.
They alleged that features including autoplay and infinite scrolling encouraged prolonged use and contributed to compulsive behavior. Their claims focused on the companies’ product-design decisions, arguing that the platforms were structured to keep young users engaged rather than simply providing neutral spaces for communication and entertainment.
Both teenagers had previously settled their claims against TikTok and YouTube.
The companies have rejected allegations that their platforms were deliberately designed to addict young people. They have maintained that they have introduced measures intended to make their services safer and provide environments where younger users can express themselves.
The distinction between harmful content and platform design has become integral to the litigation. Rather than focusing exclusively on individual posts or interactions, the lawsuits challenge features that influence how users navigate applications, receive recommendations and spend time on social media.
The Los Angeles case was selected from hundreds of pending lawsuits as a test case. Such proceedings are closely watched because their outcomes can influence settlement negotiations and legal strategies in other cases involving similar allegations.
However, the latest settlements mean the current trial will not produce a jury determination of Meta’s responsibility for the specific claims brought by the two teenagers.
Earlier Verdicts Increase Pressure on Technology Companies
The litigation follows an earlier Los Angeles trial that ended in March, when a jury found Meta and YouTube negligent and awarded a young woman $6 million in damages.
That verdict became an important development in the wider legal campaign, providing plaintiffs with a jury finding against major technology companies over claims involving social media use and harm to young people.
Other cases selected for early trials have also ended without full jury verdicts. The next two teenagers whose lawsuits were chosen either settled or dropped their claims, while the first school district selected for trial reached settlements with all the companies involved.
The pattern highlights the role of settlements in determining how the litigation progresses. Companies can resolve individual claims without allowing juries to establish findings that might influence other proceedings, although the terms and legal implications of each settlement vary.
Meta has also faced pressure from state governments. In August, the company reached settlements worth up to $18 billion with nearly every US state and territory to resolve lawsuits brought by attorneys general over alleged harm to teenagers. The agreements included commitments to make changes to how Instagram and Facebook operate for younger users.
The company is confronting a separate legal dispute in New Mexico. Earlier this month, a judge ordered Meta to pay a $25 billion penalty after a jury found that it had misled Facebook users about data privacy and its handling of hate speech. Meta has said it will appeal the decision.
These cases involve different legal claims, but together they show the breadth of the regulatory and litigation challenges facing the company. The social media addiction lawsuits focus on alleged product-design decisions and their effects on young users, while the New Mexico case concerns representations about privacy and content moderation.
For the wider technology industry, the litigation raises questions about how platforms should account for the effects of engagement-driven design, particularly when products are used by children. Features such as autoplay, personalized recommendations and infinite scrolling are common across digital services, but their role in encouraging prolonged use is increasingly becoming a subject of legal scrutiny.
The settlement with K.D.B. removes Meta from the latest trial, but it does not resolve the wider allegations against the company or other social media platforms. Hundreds of cases remain pending, and the proceedings against Snap will continue to test how courts assess claims that platform design contributed to harm among young users.