Seattle public schools district files lawsuit against social media platforms
By MYBRANDBOOK
Accusing multiple major social media companies of harming young people’s mental health across the US, Seattle’s public schools district has filed a lawsuit against them.
The lawsuit was filed on Friday with a US district court and accused the social media companies like TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and YouTube of creating a “mental health crisis among America’s youth”.
“Defendants’ growth is a product of choices they made to design and operate their platforms in ways that exploit the psychology and neurophysiology of their users into spending more and more time on their platforms. These techniques are both particularly effective and harmful to the youth audience,” the 91-page lawsuit said.
“Defendants have successfully exploited the vulnerable brains of youth, hooking tens of millions of students across the country into positive feedback loops of excessive use and abuse of Defendants’ social media platforms,” it added. It cited harmful content including extreme diet plans and encouragements of self-harm.
The lawsuit went on to attribute the companies’ alleged misconduct to the rising rates of anxiety, depression, thoughts of self-harm and suicide ideation experienced among young people.
According to the lawsuit, from 2009 to 2019, there was on average a 30% increase in the number of students at Seattle public schools who reported feeling “so sad or hopeless almost every day for two weeks or more in a row that [they] stopped doing some usual activities”.
The lawsuit said that as students experience various mental health issues including anxiety and depression, their performance in schools drop, making them less likely to attend school and more likely to engage in substance use and to “act out”, in turn hindering “Seattle public schools’ ability to fulfill its educational mission”.
Under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, the federal law helps provide immunity for online platforms with respect to third-party users and what they choose to post as content.
However, the lawsuit claims that the provision does not protect the social media companies and says they are liable for recommending, distributing and promoting content and marketing their social media platforms “in a way that causes harm”.
According to the lawsuit, the school district is seeking damages as a result of the “public nuisance” which it has asked the court to order the companies to stop creating. The district is also seeking money to pay for prevention education and treatment for excessive and problematic use of social media.
The latest version of X helps prevent deepfakes on social medi
To combat deepfakes and shallowfakes, Elon Musk revealed a new update t...
India and Namibia collaborate on a payment system similar to U
Once operational, the platform will enable digital transactions in Namibia,...
Sebi issues show-cause notices to six Adani group firms
Sebi issued show-cause notices to six Adani Group firms, including Adani ...
Microsoft to build a new data centre to support Thailand's tec
Microsoft has revealed intentions to construct a regional data centre as w...
CENTRE FOR DEVELOPMENT OF TELEMATICS
SAMRIDDHI AUTOMATIONS PVT. LTD.
AMARA RAJA POWER SYSTEMS LTD.
HAVELLS INDIA LTD.
Technology Icons Of India 2023: Ritesh Agarwal
Ritesh Agarwal Founder & CEO of OYO Hotels & Homes-World’s fastest g...
Technology Icons Of India 2023: Ashish Kumar Chauhan
Ashish works as the CEO of the National Stock Exchange (NSE). He is al...
Technology Icons Of India 2023: Amit Chadha
. An influential leader in the engineering services industry for over ...
NPCI leading India towards Digital payments
The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is an initiative tak...
STPI encouraging software exports from India
Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) is an S&T organization under...
NIC bridging the digital divide and supporting government in eGovernance
The National Informatics Centre (NIC) is an Indian government departme...
R P TECH INDIA
R P Tech is recognized for its diverse products portfolio, value-add...
M. TECH SOLUTIONS (I) PVT. LTD.
M.Tech is a leading cyber security and network performance solutions ...
SATCOM INFOTECH PVT. LTD.
Satcom Infotech Pvt. Ltd is a distribution houses in security in India...