DIGITAL LIFE

Number of lawsuits filed by individuals against various social media platforms increases in the United States

The number of lawsuits filed by individuals against various social media platforms is increasing in the United States. This phenomenon is global and Canadian schools have also taken legal action. In the USA, however, the phenomenon is even greater.

To give you an idea, just one office, the Social Media Victims Law Center (Legal Center for Victims of Social Media, in free translation) represents more than 2 thousand clients in processes of this type. In several cases, hundreds of these individual lawsuits have been consolidated into class actions in federal and state courts.

The lawsuits allege that the “unprecedented mental health crisis among children” is fueled by these companies’ “defective,” “addictive” and “dangerous” products. The objective is for companies to suspend practices identified as harmful and, in many cases, involve claims for compensation.

The companies, in turn, reject the allegations and state that they are constantly implementing and updating tools and resources to protect children and adolescents on their platforms.

But is this enough? The authors of the actions say no. For families who have lost children, current measures are ineffective and poorly monitored.

Families suffer... There are cases of children who took their own lives after being bullied online. There are also those who enter communities that normalize or even encourage suicide. Others died after online “challenges” – perhaps people still remember the blue whale game, in 2017, or the Momo doll, the following year.

Now, not all cases involve deaths, but they leave cruel trauma. Some children have been victims of some type of sexual exploitation, or face problems such as eating disorders, depression and anxiety.

A BBC report tells the story of a family who lost their youngest daughter, American teenager Morgan Pieper, who took her own life at the age of 15.

The mother, a nurse, says that the girl created her first account on a platform, Facebook, when she was 11 years old. Before long, she had also opened profiles on Instagram and Snapchat.

Within a few months, she started sleeping less, spent nights awake scrolling through her cell phone and started creating fake accounts. At 13, the young woman began self-harming – the family sought professional help and she stopped. Two years later, however, at 15, the teenager committed suicide.

Kristina is one of hundreds of American mothers and fathers who are suing social media companies for alleged “physical, mental or emotional harm” suffered by children and teenagers when using these platforms.

She files a lawsuit against Meta, owner of Facebook and Instagram, and Snap, owner of Snapchat. Lawsuits from other families also target Google, which runs YouTube, and ByteDance, which runs TikTok.

Congress watching...All of these companies mentioned took representatives to a hearing held by the US Senate at the end of January.

Congressmen investigate the impact of social networks on young people and the sexual exploitation of children online.

Fathers and mothers whose children died or suffered sexual exploitation, abuse and other harm online also participated in the session.

Among the executives present were Meta co-founder and president, Mark Zuckerberg; Snapchat's Evan Spiegel; and Shou Zi Chew, from TikTok (ByteDance).

The companies presented their defenses at the time.

The most impactful, however, was a statement from Zuckerberg, who apologized to all family members who are suffering.

Despite the apology, little has changed in recent months.

One of the goals of the hearing was to increase support for several bills to protect children online.

The initiative managed to unite a rare joint effort by Democrats and Republicans.

Still, things are moving slowly: these proposals face resistance to approval, and previous attempts to regulate technology giants have failed.

Faced with difficulties in approving federal legislation, several American states have adopted their own laws to increase protections for young people online.

Many of these initiatives, however, are being challenged in court by technology companies.

Additionally, some civil rights groups fear that these laws will interfere with freedom of expression.

Solidarity network... While the United States and the rest of the world do not define laws on the subject and big techs do not find a solution to this crisis, it is up to us to try to help in some way. Because the problem exists and sometimes these people just need support.

mundophone