Video sharing app TikTok has made an eleventh-hour deal to avoid a landmark US trial accusing it, along with Meta and YouTube, of addicting young people to social media, lawyers said yesterday.
The deal was made as jury selection was to begin in a Los Angeles court that could establish a legal precedent on whether social media companies deliberately designed their platforms to addict children.
The case being heard in the California state court is being called a “bellwether” proceeding because its outcome could set the tone for a tidal wave of similar litigation across the US.
The remaining defendants in the suit are Alphabet and Meta, the tech titans behind YouTube and Instagram.
Meta co-founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg is slated to be called as a witness during the trial.
“The parties are pleased to have reached an amicable resolution of this dispute,” the Social Media Victims Law Center said, noting that the terms of the settlement with TikTok are confidential.
The case focuses on allegations that a 19-year-old woman identified by the initials K.G.M. suffered severe mental harm because she was addicted to social media. After joining YouTube at age six, Instagram at 11,
Snapchat at 13, and TikTok at 14, the Californian claims to have developed an addiction to the sites that contributed to her depression, anxiety, body image issues and that stoked suicidal thoughts.