Mark Zuckerberg has to testify in court.archive image: keystone
A trial has begun in the United States over allegations of promoting social media addiction. Two dominant US tech companies are indicted.
02/10/2026, 07:4702/10/2026, 08:03
Christoph Cöln / t-online
“Instagram and YouTube have developed nothing more than addictive machines.”
Plaintiff attorney
A potentially groundbreaking trial has begun in the USA against several internet giants over allegations of promoting social media addiction.
Attorneys for the opposing sides made their opening statements to a jury in Los Angeles on Monday. At the start of the trial, the plaintiff’s lawyer, Mark Lanier, accused Meta and YouTube of having “created addiction” among underage users.
The defendants are Google parent company Alphabet and Meta – the tech giants behind YouTube, Facebook and Instagram. The video platform TikTok, operated by the Bytedance group, reached an out-of-court settlement shortly before the trial began. The US companies are accused of having specifically designed their platforms to promote addiction for children and young people.
Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg’s testimony is expected next week, Instagram boss Adam Mosseri will not be interviewed until Wednesday at the earliest. Neil Mohan, the head of YouTube, and Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, are also expected to be summoned.
Like the tobacco industry
The trial, presided over by Judge Carolyn Kuhl, centers on the case of a 19-year-old woman whose name is abbreviated as KGM. She accuses the operators of social media networks of making her addicted and causing her serious psychological damage.
The plaintiffs’ lawyers are using strategies used against the tobacco industry in the 1990s and 2000s. The wave of lawsuits at that time argued, among other things, that the companies were selling a harmful product.
The upcoming trial is not about individual allegations such as online bullying, i.e. the targeted intimidation and discrimination of people on social networks, stalking, i.e. the digital stalking of people, or specific online manipulation – up to and including suicide. It’s more about the digital structures behind it.
Zuckerberg probably demanded longer retention times
The plaintiffs argue that the social media platforms are designed using algorithms in such a way that users have to become addicted to the content – and that the platform operators not only accept this, but also deliberately design their products in such a way that users become addicted.
Mark Lanier, one of the plaintiffs’ lawyers, said in his opening statement to the jury: “Instagram and YouTube have developed nothing other than addictive machines.” In a 2015 email that Lanier presented to the jury, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg demanded that his employees increase the average time spent on the company’s apps by 12 percent within a year.
“This case is about two of the richest companies in history that have addicted children’s brains,” Lanier said. And:
“I’m going to explain to you the search engine they built, using internal documents that no one normally sees and emails from Mark Zuckerberg and YouTube executives.”
Meta refers to “commitment to young people”
Meta has rejected the allegations in advance. A YouTube spokesman called the allegations “simply false.” In a statement it said:
“We firmly reject the allegations and trust that the evidence will demonstrate our long-standing commitment to the well-being of young people.”
YouTube said in a statement:
“Providing young people with a safe and healthy environment has always been one of our core values.”
If the judge actually makes a judgment against the two internet companies, this could go down as a precedent in legal history. The companies will then most likely face further lawsuits. Snapchat and TikTok were named as defendants in the lawsuit, but entered into settlement agreements before the trial began. The contents of the agreements were not made public.
At the same time as the lawsuit in Los Angeles, numerous similar proceedings against the internet giants are pending in various federal courts in the USA, including in California.