New York City sues social media companies over ‘youth mental health crisis’

Here’s a new element in the standoff between the East Coast and the West Coast: New York City is reaching out across the country to sue California-headquartered tech giants over allegations that their platforms have caused a mental health crisis for young people. The city, along with school districts and the health department, alleges that “gross negligence” on the part of Meta, Alphabet, Snap and ByteDance got kids addicted to social media, creating a “public nuisance” that puts a strain on city resources.

In a Complaint of 327 pages The city, filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, alleges that the technology companies designed their platforms in a way that sought to “maximize the number of children” using them, and built “algorithms that weaponize user data against children and fuel the addiction machine.” The city also alleges that these companies “know that children and adolescents are at a developmental stage that makes them particularly vulnerable to the addictive effects of these traits,” but they “target them anyway, in pursuit of additional profits.”

Claims that social media is addictive for underage users are not necessarily new. New York State, in fact, is Part of a coalition of countries Which filed a lawsuit against social media companies for allegedly exploiting young users. But the New York City lawsuit provides some unique, jurisdiction-specific information. She cites data from the New York City Police Department, for example, showing that at least 16 teens died while “subway surfing” — riding off a moving train — a dangerous behavior that the lawsuit claims was encouraged by social media trends. Two girls, 12 and 13 years old. He died earlier this month While surfing the subway.

She also cited survey data collected from New York high school students, showing that 77.3% of the city’s teens spend three or more hours a day in front of screens, which she claims has contributed to sleep loss, and therefore school absences — something confirmed by the city’s school districts, which provided data to show that 36.2% of all public school students are considered chronically absent, missing out on at least 10% of the academic year.

According to ReutersThis lawsuit from New York City is part of a larger effort by other governments to hold social media companies accountable. There are more than 2,050 similar lawsuits. City Withdraw the previous lawsuitannounced by Mayor Eric Adams in 2024, to join this broader effort in federal court. In doing so, New York City immediately becomes one of the largest claimants, with a population of 8.48 million and nearly 2 million residents under the age of 18.

“These lawsuits fundamentally misunderstand how YouTube works, and the claims are simply not true,” Jose Castañeda, a Google spokesperson, told Gizmodo. “YouTube is a streaming service where people come to watch everything from live sports to podcasts from their favorite content creators, primarily on television, not a social network where people go to connect with YouTube.” “Friends.” “We’ve also developed personalized tools like supervised experiences for youth, with guidance from child safety experts, that put families in control.”

Gizmodo reached out to Meta, Snap, and ByteDance for comment but did not receive a response at press time.