Appeals Court Clears Way for 3,000+ Youth Addiction Lawsuits Against Meta, Google, TikTok, Snap to Proceed

On Monday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco rejected an attempt by Meta, Alphabet's Google, ByteDance's TikTok and Snap Inc's Snapchat to kill more than 3,000 federal lawsuits before they even go to trial, according to Reuters. The companies wanted the appeals court to rule that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act protects them from claims they designed addictive products for kids. The court didn't buy the timing.

What the Court Actually Decided

This wasn't a ruling on the merits. The 9th Circuit didn't decide whether Section 230 ultimately shields these companies. It ruled the companies tried to appeal too early. Section 230, the court said, provides "a defense to liability, not an immunity from suit," according to Forbes. That's a technical distinction with a big practical effect: the companies have to lose first, then appeal, not skip the line.

Most appeals happen after a case wraps up with a verdict or ruling. Meta and TikTok wanted an exception. The court said no.

That means the more than 3,000 consolidated federal lawsuits, coordinated before U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in Oakland, keep moving. Roughly 3,300 additional related cases are also stacked up in California state court, according to lawbeat.in. These suits come from individual plaintiffs, school districts, municipalities and state governments, all alleging the platforms were engineered to hook kids and fuel a youth mental health crisis.

Meta's Trial Delay Request Denied

The same ruling also blocked Meta from delaying a trial set to start Wednesday, brought by 29 state attorneys general. That case alleges Meta illegally collected and used children's data, built its platforms to maximize youth engagement, and misled the public about the risks, according to Reuters and Al Jazeera. Meta argued the trial shouldn't proceed while its appeal was pending. The court disagreed.

Attorneys Lexi Hazam and Previn Warren, who represent thousands of school districts and individuals suing Meta and the other platforms, said the ruling clears the runway for both the states' trial this week and a separate school-district trial scheduled for February. "A trial is how the public finds out what Meta knew about its products' impact on children, when it knew it, and what it chose to do with that knowledge," they said in a statement reported by Reuters. "Meta has fought to keep that evidence from the public."

Meta and Google have denied wrongdoing in the cases decided so far and say they intend to appeal, according to TheWrap.

A Rough Year in Court

Monday's ruling lands on top of a string of losses. In March, a Los Angeles jury found Meta and Google liable in the first bellwether trial from the consolidated California litigation, awarding damages that Forbes reported as $3 million compensatory and $3 million punitive, while TheWrap cited a $6 million total figure for a different plaintiff in the same wave of trials. In New Mexico, a jury ordered Meta to pay $375 million in March for misleading users about social media's mental health effects, and a judge added another $567 million last week after ruling the company created a "public nuisance." That's more than $942 million from New Mexico alone.

Meta did notch one win: a teenage plaintiff dropped a similar lawsuit in Florida last month after already settling with TikTok, Snap and YouTube, according to the New York Times.

The Bigger Picture

The U.S. litigation is unfolding alongside a global regulatory shift. France plans to bar under-15s from social media and ban phones in high schools starting next month. Australia already enforces an under-16 social media ban, with fines up to 49.5 million Australian dollars, around $35 million, for noncompliance. Britain has signaled it will follow with its own ban next year, according to Al Jazeera.

None of that foreign regulation determines U.S. liability. It shows lawmakers abroad have already concluded what U.S. juries are now being asked to decide case by case: whether these platforms were built, deliberately, to keep kids scrolling past the point of harm.

Wednesday's trial in front of the 29 state attorneys general is the next test. Unlike the individual bellwether cases, this one targets Meta's core data practices and design choices directly, with state governments as plaintiffs rather than individual families. A verdict against Meta there would land just as the company heads toward the separate school-district trial scheduled for February.