Daniel, the 16-year-old son of Jaime Puerta, passed away four years ago after ingesting a fake oxycodone pill composed entirely of fentanyl, an illegal opioid substance that he had bought from a dealer he had met on Snapchat.
Puerta brought a wrongful death case against Snapchat in 2022. His case was among the first at the time to claim that children’s health was at risk due to social media use.
Matthew Bergman, the founder of the Social Media Victims Law Center, from which many of these cases have been filed, claims there are currently hundreds of these lawsuits against social media firms, stating teens across the nation have suffered from exposure to social media.
Families claim their kids used social media to purchase narcotics in some cases, while parents claim their teenagers hurt themselves after viewing harmful content. The filings allege a variety of damages, including sorrow.
On their websites, Meta, TikTok, and Snapchat state that they don’t allow content that encourages self-harm or the sale of prescription or narcotic medications. Additionally, the platforms include tools that let parents limit how long their teenagers spend on the applications, check the age of users, and limit who they can chat with.
A Meta representative told CNN, “We want to reassure every parent that we have their interests at heart in the work we’re doing to help provide teens with safe experiences online.” “These are complex issues, but we’re going to keep working with experts and hearing from parents to develop new features, tools, and policies that meet the needs of teens and their families and are effective.”
Under Section 230, which stipulates that tech companies cannot be held accountable for certain of the content that users publish to their platforms, and the First Amendment, the social media giants filed motions to dismiss some of the claims. But other cases—like Puerta’s lawsuit—have already been given the go-ahead to proceed in court.
