Keir Starmer has said he will tackle “addictive features” in social media after a landmark US court ruling held Meta and YouTube responsible for harms caused by designing addictive technology. The Prime Minister said the verdict signalled a rising public expectation for more aggressive regulation.
“The status quo isn’t good enough,” he said. “We need to do more to protect children. That’s why we’re consulting about issues such as banning social media for under-16s. I’m very keen that we do more on addictive features within social media.”
Jurors in a California court found the tech companies negligent for failing to provide adequate warnings about potential dangers. The plaintiff, a 20-year-old woman who said she became hooked on social media as a child, was awarded $6m (£4.5m). The Duke and Duchess of Sussex called the verdict “a reckoning” and said “for too long, families have paid the price”.
Google and Meta plan to appeal. In Brussels, the European Commission’s digital chief said the case sends “a very clear message”. The Molly Rose Foundation said the government can “make safety and wellbeing the price for tech firms to do business in the UK”. Other campaigners described the ruling as a potential watershed.
Thomas Lancaster of Imperial College London noted that policies are fine but if unenforced, they put people at risk. The Tech Oversight Project’s Sacha Haworth told Reuters: “The era of big tech invincibility is over.”
