86% of Americans want Meta, Google held accountable for social media addiction disaster: survey | Latest Tech News
A whopping 86% of Americans want Meta and Google held accountable for their position in a social media addiction disaster that has fueled anxiety, eating issues and even suicide among children, according to a survey obtained by The Post.
Meanwhile, 67%, or a two-thirds of American voters, said they had been more probably to vote for US lawmakers who supported laws that would crack down on “dangerous social media features like infinite scroll, near-constant notifications, and predatory algorithms,” the survey confirmed.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is set to testify beginning Wednesday in the landmark California trial accusing Facebook, Instagram and Google’s YouTube of fueling social media addiction to enhance their earnings. The trial started on Feb. 9 and is predicted to stretch into March.
Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, arrives to testify before the US Senate Judiciary Committee listening to, “Big Tech and the Online Child intimacyual Exploitation Crisis,” in Washington, DC, on January 31, 2024. (Photo by ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS / AFP) AFP via Getty Images
The Tech Oversight Project, which prepped the survey, called the trial a “watershed moment” with the potential for real penalties for Big Tech. The case is seen as a bellwether that may determine how related trials around the nation are determined for years to come.
“This trial has already proven that there is a direct link between Big Tech’s dangerous product designs and real-world harms, and it should come as no surprise that voters are mad as hell and want Congress to do something about it,” said Sacha Haworth, government director of the Tech Oversight Project.
One such proposal, according to the Tech Oversight Project, is the Kids Online Safety Act – a long-delayed bipartisan invoice meant to improve security necessities on social media apps. The Senate model of the invoice would impose a legal “duty of care” on corporations to guarantee their merchandise are protected.
Respondents to the survey agreed that social media giants ought to be held accountable for evidence that has surfaced at the trial, including inside paperwork that revealed “companies buried research showing their products had damaging effects,” according to the outcomes.
The online survey was performed by polling service YouGov from Feb. 11 to Feb. 13 and had a pattern dimension of 1,000 respondents. The margin of error was +/- 3.9%.
New York Post cowl for Thursday, February 1, 2024, after Mark Zuckerberg testifed before Congress about online hurt brought about by social media. rfaraino
“For the first time, Meta is in the prone position of having to produce documents under court order – with actual legal penalties on the line,” said Haworth. “This isn’t a consequence-free zone or yet another opportunity to lie to lawmakers without fear of penalty.”
Meta didn’t immediately return a request for remark. Google declined to remark.
A trove of inside Meta and Google paperwork has surfaced as a end result of the trial.
Parents who misplaced kids to social media associated harms maintain a vigil forward of a social media addiction trial set to start next week, in Los Angeles, California, U.S. February 5, 2026. REUTERS/Jill Connelly REUTERS
In one not too long ago unsealed documented cited by the Tech Oversight Project, Meta staff mentioned in 2017 how Zuckerberg “has been talking about [going after <13y/o users] for a while.” Another Meta worker responded that Zuckerberg’s focus on boosting engagement by teen customers was “gross.”
In inside research slides from 2018, Facebook worker mentioned how “people who are particularly sensitive to social rewards might find FB use more rewarding and therefore use it more.”
The lead plaintiff in the trial is a 20-year-old girls recognized only as “Kaley” or “KGM,” who alleges that intentionally addictive options in Instagram and YouTube bought her hooked and fueled a downward spiral that included depression and suicidal ideas.
During opening arguments, KGM’s lawyer Mark Lanier argued the case was as “easy as ABC,” with ABC standing for “addicting the brains of children.”
Lanier also alleged that Meta and Google would “try to blame the little girl and her parents for the trap they built” during the trial.
Attorneys for Google and Meta argue that Kaley’s points had been pushed by issues in her personal life quite than the app design decisions. Both corporations say have have labored onerous to shield online customers, particularly children, from hurt.
A lawyer for Google said Kaley had a five-year average watch time on YouTube of 29 minutes per day and an average daily watch time on short-form YouTube shorts of 1 minute and 14 seconds.
TikTok and Snap had been initially defendants in the case, but hammered out settlements before the trial started.
Instagram chief Adam Mosseri sought to downplay allegations that social media apps are addictive during his testimony last week, arguing that it was “important to differentiate between clinical addiction and problematic use.”
“I’m sure I said that I’ve been addicted to a Netflix show when I binged it really late one night, but I don’t think it’s the same thing as clinical addiction,” said.
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