San Mateo education board files lawsuit against social media companies

Negative impact of children’s mental health due to social media

Washington (US) – San Mateo County school officials filed a lawsuit this week alleging three major social media companies YouTube, TikTok and Snapchat are designed to be purposefully addictive and that the platforms have sparked a mental health crisis among young people. Their deployment of artificial intelligence algorithms keeps children and teenagers tied to social media Apps in unhealthy ways. The complaint also accuses the companies of racketeering, gross negligence, conspiracy, and unfair competition.

Antigone Davis, Meta’s Global Head of Safety, said the company wants teens to be safe online and offers more than 30 safety tools for kids and families, including supervision and age verification technology. “We automatically set teens’ accounts to private when they join Instagram, and we send notifications encouraging them to take regular breaks,” Davis said in a statement. “We don’t allow content that promotes suicide, self-harm or eating disorders, and of the content we remove or take action on, we identify over 99% of it before it’s reported to us.”

Editorial viewpoint

This incident suggests that society needs to be made aware of the ill-effects of social media.