TikTok, Instagram, Up To Snapchat Called As 'Monster' Application For Children

JAKARTA - Hundreds of families in the United States have reportedly sued a number of social media companies because they are considered to provide dangerous and destructive products for children.

The companies being sued are TikTok, Facebook and Instagram, Google, and Snapchat. From the BBC report, a number of plaintiffs feel that the social media is causing several dangers such as depression and suicide attempts.

One of the plaintiffs that BBC met was Taylor Little. The plaintiff admitted that he was addicted when he was 12 years old. He said that his entire teenage years had disappeared and could not return because of the addiction problem.

Currently, Taylor is 21 years old. He realized that the social media development technology company was a huge monster that was so terrible. According to Taylor, a number of companies deliberately create highly addictive products to damage children.

Apart from Taylor, another plaintiff came from the family of Molly Russel, a 14-year-old student who died of self-injury due to depression and negative effects from social media.

During the trial of the lawsuits from hundreds of families, the investigation into the case of Molly's death was used as evidence. Molly's name was also mentioned up to eleven times in the main complaint filed in court.

Hundreds of families who sued also won. United States (US) federal judges rejected Alphabet's efforts to manage Google, Meta that manage Instagram and Facebook, ByteDance that manages TikTok, and Snap that manage Snapchat in avoiding litigation of the addiction case.

The company seems reluctant to seek legal settlements to provide compensation to the affected children. Luckily, US District Judge Yvonne Gonzales Rogers, in a Reuters report some time ago, sided with the plaintiffs.

The judges felt that the plaintiffs conveyed a quite logical theory, such as negligence in the responsibility for the damaged control of parents, devices that cannot be limited in time specifically for children, to the difficulty of deactivating accounts.

Although basically the company does not have a legal obligation to protect consumers from the dangers posed by third parties, the judge feels that the plaintiffs' claims are indeed wider than just the dangers of third parties.