We have closely covered the advancing legal cases against social media companies for knowingly designing addictive algorithms that harm mental health, especially the mental health of children. School districts all across North America are banning smartphone use and suing social media companies for the added costs their products are imposing.

Today, we get a rare glimpse at the social media addiction lawsuits from a different perspective – that of the Global Legal Group and their house organ, IGLC News. Through their publications, International Comparative Legal Guides and Global Legal Insights, GLC provides “legal analysis to business and legal communities worldwide.”

The Halloween edition of IGLC News contains some of the first insights as to how the global legal business community is looking at social media addiction liability. In a filing on October 29 with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, for the first time put a dollar estimate on its exposure to social media addiction claims:

The damages or penalties that plaintiffs have indicated they intend to seek range widely in amount, including in certain cases up to the high tens of billions of dollars.

Meta described the nature of the complaints as “asserting that design features and recommendation algorithms on Instagram and Facebook caused or exacerbated mental-health harm among minors.” The company went on to describe the progress of the cases:

Beginning in November 2024, counsel for tens of thousands of individual claimants began sending mass arbitration demands relating to “social media addiction” and related harms allegedly caused by Instagram. 

Cases objecting to the content on social media have largely been dismissed under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, exempting common carriers for liability related to content users post on their platforms. The social media addiction cases come at it from a different legal angle, as described by IGLC News:

The filing demonstrates the legal system’s growing willingness to treat algorithmic design as a product-safety issue.

The lawsuits involve a “duty to care” in the design of software and a “failure to warn” of the risks of addiction and psychological harm. This legal approach could lead to a “tobacco-style litigation wave,” warn the counselors. The GLC sees significant litigation risk on three fronts:

Scale: Tens of thousands of lawsuits have already been filed.

Valuation: Tens of billions of dollars in judgments are possible

Disclosure: Liability could spread to the lawyers who advise social media companies

IGLC News concludes with the somber news that just by disclosing the risk in their quarterly SEC filings, Meta has made the outcome much more likely:

By recognising potential exposure in the tens of billions, Meta has effectively confirmed to markets and regulators that social-media addiction litigation is a serious corporate-governance risk, not merely a speculative nuisance.

The GLC advises attorneys to “get to grips with without delay” on the issues of social media addiction, smartphone addiction, and internet addiction. We recommend they start here at AddictionNews, where we’ve been tracking the cases for years.

Written by Steve O’Keefe. First published November 5, 2025.

Sources:

“Meta warns of ‘tens of billions’ in potential exposure over algorithm-addiction claims,” IGLC News, October 31, 2025.

“Inside the massive social media addiction cases,” Axios, August 21, 2025.

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