Big Tobacco Whistleblower Accuses Meta and YouTube of Knowingly Designing Addictive Products for Children

Meta and YouTube Found Liable for Creating Addictive Products to Harm Children

A Los Angeles jury has delivered a verdict that has sent shockwaves through the tech industry, finding that Meta and YouTube deliberately created products that are designed to harm children. The trial, which was closely watched by Jeffrey Stephen Wigand, a biochemist who acted as a whistleblower in the tobacco industry's landmark trials in the 1990s, has drawn parallels with the trials faced by tobacco companies who targeted children in the 1990s to use their products.

According to Wigand, social media companies are using their advertisements to target children, much like the big tobacco companies he exposed. Wigand, who was hired by tobacco company Brown & Williamson in 1989 to develop a safer cigarette, said that both tobacco and social media companies "intentionally addicted" children "so they could use them as cashflow." He claimed that social media companies knew that their platforms were addictive and chose to target children because they have a "malleable brain" that's easy to manipulate.

The Los Angeles court found that both Meta and YouTube knew or should have known that their services posed a danger to minors. The jury also found that the companies failed to adequately warn users of this danger, and that a reasonable platform operator would have done so.

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The verdict underscores the potential multibillion-dollar exposure from lawsuits claiming that Instagram, YouTube, and other platforms are intentionally designed to addict young users without regard for their well-being. The jury ordered Meta and YouTube to pay $6 million in damages, including $3 million in punitive damages.

Wigand has listed a few things that social media companies and authorities can do to ensure children are not harmed by the addiction factor. He suggested that social media companies can enact logical steps to put guardrails on access for children and that governments can also take measures to limit the age for using social media. Many countries are already starting to put a limit on the age for using social media, with Australia leading the way.