Meta claims win after teen drops Instagram addiction lawsuit

A 15-year-old Florida plaintiff known in court filings as R.K.C.

dropped his social media addiction lawsuit against Meta on Wednesday, per Reuters. The Los Angeles Superior Court trial was set to begin Monday, July 27. Meta had been preparing to defend Instagram and Facebook before a California state court jury.

R.K.C.

had originally named Google’s YouTube, Meta’s Instagram, Snap’s Snapchat, and ByteDance’s TikTok as defendants. YouTube and TikTok settled in June for confidential amounts. A person close to the case said Snap had also settled.

That left Meta as the last defendant standing when R.K.C.

chose to withdraw. Meta and the plaintiff frame dismissal differently Meta framed the plaintiff’s withdrawal as vindication, adding that R.K.

C. dropped his claims without receiving any payment, according to a spokeswoman. The claims never held up, and this outcome makes clear that we will not back away from defending ourselves against baseless lawsuits Meta R.

K.C.’s lawyers described the same event differently.

They said he chose to end the fight “in light of the overall successful result of the litigation” and his concerns about a grueling weeks-long trial, adding that he wanted to focus on recovery and therapy. The plaintiff, who began using social media at about age 8, had claimed that infinite scroll and autoplay features drove compulsive use that became a form of addiction, causing anxiety, sleep deprivation, and depression. Three of the four original defendants paid R.

K.C. before Meta’s trial date arrived, which his lawyers point to as the actual measure of the case’s outcome.

Bellwether cases test social media addiction claims R.K.C.’

s case was one of a small group of bellwether cases inside more than 3,300 individual lawsuits consolidated in California state court, all accusing social media firms of engineering products to hook young users. Bellwether outcomes serve as guidance for layers in determining the value of other claims pending in litigation and for form