A little after 8 a.m. on Thursday, the doors of Room 12 at the Superior Court building in downtown Los Angeles swung open, and the day’s proceedings began with the quiet gravity of a historic moment. Lawyers lugged handcarts stacked high with boxes of documents, creaking under the weight of evidence, while the seventeen jurors filed into the room—twelve core members and five alternates—followed by Judge Carolyn Kuhl. “Good morning, everyone,” she said. “Everybody may be seated.” Outside observers, press, and bereaved parents lined the gallery, aware that they were witnessing a trial that could determine the future of social media.
Meta and YouTube, the defendants, are accused of creating deliberately addictive platforms that harmed the mental and emotional health of a 20-year-old woman identified in court as KGM. She began posting videos on YouTube at age six and, by adolescence, described herself as addicted to Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube. KGM claims that this addiction contributed to body dysmorphia, anxiety, depression, and self-harm. TikTok and Snapchat, originally co-defendants, settled before the trial began, leaving the spotlight squarely on Meta and YouTube.
The stakes are enormous. Kuhl selected KGM’s case as a bellwether for more than 1,200 lawsuits filed across the United States, meaning the trial’s outcome could set a precedent for how courts view social media’s responsibility for mental health. Ellen Roome, a grieving parent, and others demonstrated outside the courthouse, holding photographs of loved ones lost to the harms they believe were exacerbated by online platforms. KGM’s legal team aims not only for unspecified damages but also to establish that social media companies can be held liable for the addictive design of their products. Should they succeed, features like infinite scroll and autoplay, which dominate modern apps, could face sweeping redesigns. Critics argue the industry may have reached its “Big Tobacco moment,” with hopes of a settlement on a scale comparable to the 1998 tobacco fund, which allocated $206 billion to cover public health costs.
Inside the courtroom, the scene was a study in contrast. KGM’s attorney, Mark Lanier, a Texan with a folksy, preacher-like style, highlighted passages with oversized colored pencils and doodled notes as witnesses spoke. Lanier, known for winning more than $20 billion in product liability damages in cases ranging from asbestos to opioids, was joined by two of his daughters. Facing him was an elite team of corporate lawyers from Covington & Burling and Wilson Sonsini, representing the pinnacle of Big Tech defense.
The jury itself reflected the diversity of the American public: young Latinos, senior Asian citizens, African-American men, and white women. Their verdict could mark social media’s reckoning, more than two decades after Mark Zuckerberg launched Facebook and ushered in the era of mass social media. The trial is scheduled to conclude by March 20.
Central to the case is KGM, who testified about her compulsive use of social media from an early age. By ten, she was experiencing depression and engaging in self-harm. “When I got a bunch of likes, I was really happy,” she said. “If I didn’t get a lot of likes, I would feel I shouldn’t have posted it, I was ugly.” Her testimony included a ten-meter-long banner of Instagram photos, almost all edited with beauty filters, illustrating the pressure and distortion she experienced. Experts, including a former therapist and a psychiatrist, testified that social media had worsened her mental health and met clinical criteria for addiction.
Meta executives, including Zuckerberg and Adam Mosseri, denied that their platforms were designed to be addictive, attributing KGM’s struggles to a troubled personal life. Lawyers produced hundreds of pages of medical records and psychological evaluations to support their argument. “The question for the jury in Los Angeles is whether Instagram was a substantial factor in the plaintiff’s mental health struggles,” Meta said. “The evidence will show she faced many significant, difficult challenges well before she ever used social media.”
The case is part of a global shift. Australia has banned social media accounts for under-16s, while in the United States, similar lawsuits and protests have emerged in New Mexico and Washington. Bereaved parents and advocacy groups have become vocal critics of what they describe as insufficient regulatory measures to protect children online.
A pivotal moment in the trial came with the testimony of Arturo Béjar, a former Meta safety executive turned whistleblower. Béjar described creating a fake Instagram account for a 13-year-old and discovering thousands of posts from users under 13, despite Meta’s repeated claims of strict age enforcement. He accused the company of “safety theatre” and deliberately underfunding the teams responsible for child safety, arguing that reporting tools were intentionally cumbersome. His testimony aimed to challenge the narrative presented by Meta executives and underscore systemic failures in the platforms’ approach to user wellbeing.
Meta’s lawyers, led by Instagram’s Phyllis Jones, attacked Béjar’s credibility during cross-examination, highlighting minor inconsistencies in his previous deposition and emphasizing his part-time consulting role. “You just don’t know at all, right?” she repeatedly asked, portraying him as insufficiently informed to critique Meta’s safety systems.
By 4:30 p.m., the courtroom adjourned, and the jury was reminded not to discuss the case. They would return the next day, marking the first day when Meta and YouTube could formally present their defense. Outside, the implications of the trial extended far beyond the courthouse. The verdict could influence not only corporate practices but the daily experiences of hundreds of millions of young people who engage with social media worldwide.
For KGM, the apps that shaped her adolescence represent more than platforms—they are a lens through which the jury must consider the consequences of addictive design. “I just felt like I wanted to be on it all the time,” she testified. “If I wasn’t on it, I was going to miss out on something.” In Los Angeles, the courtroom has become a stage for a reckoning that could change social media forever, a story chronicled in detail by Times UK.
