Snap Settles Teen Social Media Addiction Lawsuit on the Eve of Trial, the Last Defendant to Do So
Snapchat's parent company resolved claims from two teenagers days before opening arguments, after Meta, Alphabet and TikTok had already settled.
Snap, the parent company of Snapchat, settled a social media addiction lawsuit on Monday, resolving the claims of two teenagers just before the case was due to go to trial this month. Opening arguments had been scheduled for this week.
The terms of the deal were not disclosed. In a statement, the parties said they were "pleased to have been able to resolve this matter in an amicable manner."
The plaintiffs are identified in court documents only as S.J. and K.D.B. They allege that Snapchat was designed to be addictive and that using it from a young age contributed to their mental health problems. Mark Lanier of The Lanier Law Firm is lead counsel, and Emily Jeffcott of Morgan & Morgan is trial counsel for K.D.B. Lanier said, "We believe this jury would have found the companies' conduct reprehensible."
Snap was the last defendant in the case to settle. Meta settled the week before, and Alphabet and TikTok also resolved the claims, leaving the courtroom without a defendant on the eve of the proceeding.
The case was one of several bellwether trials, test cases meant to show how juries respond to claims that platforms were engineered to hook young users. Earlier this year, a jury found Meta and YouTube, which is owned by Google, liable in an earlier bellwether and awarded $6 million to the lead plaintiff.
The settlements come against a backdrop of mounting legal pressure on the industry. In August, Meta agreed to pay up to $17.1 billion and to add child-safety measures as part of a settlement with dozens of U.S. states. The states had accused Meta of deliberately designing addictive platforms and misleading users about the risks.
Settling avoids what could have been a damaging public airing of internal company documents and testimony. It also leaves open the question of what a jury would have decided in a case against all four companies together, since the outcome of a trial would have been a data point for the many similar claims still pending.
In practical terms, a case that was set to put four of the largest social media companies in front of a single jury ended with all four settling before opening arguments. The exact trial date and the dollar amount of Snap's settlement were not stated in the statements made public so far, and the companies did not admit wrongdoing in the statement released Monday.
