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A California state judge on June 10 rejected motions from Meta Platforms and Alphabet’s Google seeking a new trial in what has become one of the most consequential tech liability cases in recent memory. The ruling keeps intact a $6 million jury verdict that found both companies negligent for designing platforms, specifically Instagram and YouTube, that fueled addiction in a child plaintiff identified as K.G.M.
The verdict, originally handed down on March 25, 2026, marked the first time a jury held social media companies financially responsible not for what users posted, but for how the platforms themselves were engineered.
What the jury found, and what the judge preserved
The original trial centered on K.G.M., also referred to as Kaley, who alleged that compulsive use of Instagram and YouTube beginning in childhood led to depression and anxiety. Her legal team argued that specific design features, things like infinite scrolling, autoplay, and push notifications, were deliberately built to maximize engagement at the expense of young users’ mental health.
The jury agreed. It apportioned 70% of the blame to Meta, ordering the company to pay $4.2 million. Google was tagged with the remaining 30%, or $1.8 million.
Both companies filed motions for a new trial, effectively asking the court to give them a do-over. The judge said no.
Why this case is different from everything before it
Tech companies have faced lawsuits over user-generated content for years and have largely won, shielded by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which generally protects platforms from liability for what users post. This case sidestepped that defense entirely.
Instead of arguing that harmful content appeared on Instagram or YouTube, the plaintiff’s attorneys focused on product design. The claim wasn’t that Meta and Google failed to moderate content. It was that the platforms were built to be compulsive, and that children were particularly vulnerable to those mechanics.
Similar cases are already moving through courts nationwide. A related challenge in Vermont recently reached the US Supreme Court, which declined to hear it. That refusal to intervene left lower court rulings in place.
Both companies plan to appeal
Neither Meta nor Google is accepting the outcome quietly. Both have stated their intention to appeal the verdict, arguing that the complex nature of teen mental health issues cannot be pinned on their platforms alone.
But the jury wasn’t asked to find that Instagram and YouTube were the only cause of Kaley’s mental health struggles. It was asked whether the companies’ design choices were a substantial contributing factor. It concluded they were.
What this means for investors
Hundreds of similar lawsuits are pending across the US, many consolidated into multidistrict litigation. If the product-design theory of liability survives appeals, each case becomes a potential payout.
For Meta specifically, Instagram has been the subject of internal research, some of it leaked, suggesting the company was aware of negative mental health effects on teen users.
Google’s exposure centers on YouTube’s autoplay and recommendation algorithms, and the company has already made some changes to its youth-facing features.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
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