NEW YORK: Google, Meta Platforms and TikTok have sued California to block enforcement of a new state law intended to limit the risk of children under 16 becoming addicted to social media platforms.
The law, known as Assembly Bill 1709, prohibits such platforms from offering underage children “psychologically exploitative features” that could lead to compulsive use, such as providing personal recommendations and sending videos through autoplay features. It also requires the deletion of children’s accounts with those features.
In separate lawsuits on Wednesday, Google, Meta and TikTok said the law wrongly compels them to honour California’s preferred means of presenting content to children, and substitutes the state’s judgement for that of parents.
They said the law violates the US Constitution’s First Amendment free speech protections, as well as Section 230 of the federal Communications Decency Act, which broadly shields online platforms from liability over user content.
The office of California Attorney General Rob Bonta, who enforces the state’s laws and is the only defendant, said on Thursday it was reviewing the lawsuits. “Our office is committed to defending California’s commonsense laws to protect kids online,” it added.
Google owns YouTube and is a unit of Alphabet, while Meta owns Facebook and Instagram. TikTok is a unit of China’s ByteDance.
Companies believe parents should decide
Governor Gavin Newsom signed the law on Sept 10, saying children’s safety should be central to any discussion about technology, and California “will not stand by while unregulated technology puts our children at risk”.
The law takes effect on Jan 1, 2027, unless a judge voids it or puts it on hold.
“Parents are best positioned to make the right decisions for their families,” Google spokesman Jose Castaneda said on Thursday. “Overly broad laws like this actually break the systems we’ve built to help kids find high-quality, age-appropriate videos.”
In its lawsuit, Meta said California cannot override its editorial judgements about how to curate and display billions of posts, while leaving children free to spend unlimited time on other online platforms that offer similar services.
TikTok, meanwhile, said protected speech “cannot be suppressed solely to protect the young from ideas or images that a legislative body thinks unsuitable”.
Other critics also accused California of overreaching. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a non-profit digital rights advocacy group, called the law “a massive privacy and free speech nightmare”.
Thousands of lawsuits allege addiction
Many US states regulate children’s access to social media. Countries around the world have similar restrictions, including a ban in Australia on social media for children under 16.
In August, Meta agreed to pay up to US$18 billion and limit teenagers’ use of Facebook and Instagram under agreements with nearly all US states, which accused it of violating privacy and consumer protection laws.
Google filed its lawsuit in federal court in San Jose, California. Meta sued in San Francisco, and TikTok sued in Los Angeles.
The companies and Snapchat parent Snap still face thousands of lawsuits by individuals, school districts, municipalities and other government entities claiming they sought to addict children and caused a mental health crisis that resulted in harms such as anxiety, depression and suicide.